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Harper's Library of Living Thought

ROUGH STONE

MONUMENTS

AND THEIR

BUILDERS

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T. ERIC PEET

HARPER X
BROTHERS

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ROUGH STONE
MONUMENTS
AND THEIR
BUILDERS

BY

T. ERIC PEET

FORMERLY SCHOLAR OF QUEEN'S COLLEGE, OXFORD ;

LATELY CRAVEN FELLOW IN THE UNIVERSITY

OF OXFORD AND PELHAM STUDENT AT

THE BRITISH SCHOOL OF ROME

HARPER & BROTHERS

LONDON AND NEW YORK

45 ALBEMARLE STREET, W.

1912

Published October, 1912.

« 9

PREFACE

THE aim of this volume is to enable those
who are interested in Stonehenge and
other great stone monuments of England to
learn something of the similar buildings which
exist in different parts of the world, of the men
who constructed them, and of the great archaeo-
logical system of which they form a part. It is
hoped that to the archaeologist it may be useful
as a complete though brief sketch of our present
knowledge of the megalithic monuments, and as
a short treatment of the problems which arise in
connection with them.

To British readers it is unnecessary to give any
justification for the comparatively full treatment
accorded to the monuments of Great Britain and
Ireland. Malta and Sardinia may perhaps seem
to occupy more than their due share of space,
but the usurpation is justified by the magnificence
and the intrinsic interest of their megalithic
buildings. Being of singularly complicated types
and remarkably well preserved they naturally
tell us much more of their builders than do the

* •
Vll

PREFACE

simpler monuments of other larger and now more
important countries. In these two islands,
moreover, research has in the last few years been
extremely active, and it is felt that the accounts
here given of them will contain some material
new even to the archaeologist.

In order to assist those readers who may wish
to follow out the subject in greater detail a short
bibliography has been added to the book.

For the figures and photographs with which
this volume is illustrated I have to thank many
archaeological societies and individual scholars.
Plate III and part of Plate II I owe to the kind-
ness of Dr. Zammit, Director of the Museum of
Valletta, while the other part of Plate II is from
a photograph kindly lent to me by Dr. Ashby.
I have to thank the Society of Antiquaries for
Figures i and 3, the Reale Accademia dei Lincei
for Figures 17 and 20, and the Societe prehistorique
de France, through Dr. Marcel Baudouin, for
Figure 10. I am indebted to the Royal Irish
Academy for Figure 8, to the Committee of the
British School of Rome for Figure 18, and to Dr.
Albert Mayr and the Akademie der Wissen-
schaften in Munich for the plan of Mnaidra. Pro-
fessors Montelius, Siret and Cartailhac I have

viii

PREFACE

to thank not only for permission to reproduce

illustrations from their works, but also for their

kind interest in my volume. Figure 19 I owe to

my friend Dr. Randall Maclver. The frontispiece

and Plate I are fine photographs by Messrs. The

Graphotone Co., Ltd.

In conclusion, I must not forget to thank

Canon F. F. Grensted for much help with regard

to the astronomical problems connected with

Stonehenge.

T. Eric' Peet.

Liverpool,

August 10th, 1912.

IX

CONTENTS

CHAPTER PAGE

I. Introduction i
II. Stonehenge and other great stone

MONUMENTS IN ENGLAND AND WALES I 5

III. Megalithic monuments in Scotland

and Ireland ..... 34

IV. The Scandinavian megalithic area 52

V. France, Spain and Portugal . . 59

VI. Italy and its islands ... 76
VII. Africa, Malta, and the smaller

Mediterranean islands . . 90

VIII. The Dolmens of Asia . . .114

IX. The builders of the megalithic
monuments, their habits, customs,
religion, etc. . . . .123

X. Who were the builders, and whence

did they come? .... 143

Bibliography 159

Index 167

xi

LIST OF ILLUSTRATIONS

PLATES

Stonehenge from the south-east

I.
II.

III.

FIGU
I.

2.

3*
4-

5-

6.

7-
8.

9-

io.

ii.

12.

13-

14.

15-

16.

17.
18.

19.

20.
21.

22.

Stonehenge from the south-west

Mnaidra, doorway of Room H

Madrone in Sardinia
Temple of Mnaidra, Malta. Apse of chief room 100

Frontispiece

FACING PAGE

. 17

The Nnraghe of

. 82

KE

Nov

Plan of Stonehenge
Avebury and Kennet Avenue
Plans of English Long Barrows
Horned tumulus, Caithness
Plans of three dolmen-types
Type-plan of simple corridor-tomb
Type-plan of wedge-shaped tomb
Corridor-tomb at New Grange, Ireland
Corridor-tomb at Ottagarden, Sweden
Plan of La Pierre aux Fees, Oise, France
Chambered mound at Fontenay-le-Marmion,

mandy
Plan of La Grotte des Fees, Aries, France
The so-called dolmen-deity, Petit Morin, France
Plan of corridor- tomb at Los Millares, Spain
Section and plan of a taIayot> Majorca
Section and plan of the nan d'Es Tudons
Elevation, section and plan of a Sardinian nuraghe
Plan of Giant's Tomb at Muraguada, Sardinia
Plan of stone circle at the Senam, Algeria
Plan of the Sese Grande, Pantelleria .
Plan of the Sanctuary of Mnaidra, Malta
Dolmen with holed stone at Ala Safat

PAGE

16
23
3i
39
40

42
44
47

53

61

63

65
66

69

72

73
83
87
94
97
99
"5

xn

.

• ■ —

ROUGH STONE MONUMENTS

CHAPTER I
INTRODUCTION

TO the south of Salisbury Plain, about two
miles west of the small country town of
Amesbury, lies the great stone circle of Stone-
henge. For centuries it has been an object of
wonder and admiration, and even to-day it is one
of the sights of our country. Perhaps, however,
few of those who have heard of Stonehenge or
even of those who have visited it are aware that
it is but a unit in a vast crowd of megalithic
monuments which, in space, extends from the
west of Europe to India, and, in time, covers
possibly more than a thousand years.

What exactly is a megalithic monument ?
Strictly speaking, it is a building made of very
large stones. This definition would, of course,
include numbers of buildings of the present day
and of the medieval and classical periods, while
many of the Egyptian pyramids and temples
would at once suggest themselves as excellent

ROUGH STONE MONUMENTS

examples of this type of building. The archaeo-
logist, however, uses the term in a much more
limited sense. He confines it to a series of tombs
and buildings constructed in Western Asia, in
North Africa, and in certain parts of Europe,
towards the end of the neolithic period and during
part of the copper and bronze ages which followed
it. The structures are usually, though not quite
invariably, made of large blocks of unworked or
slightly worked stone, and they conform to certain
definite types. The best known of these types
are as follows : Firstly, the menhir, which is a
tall, rough pillar of stone with its base fixed into
the earth. Secondly, the trilithon, which con-
sists of a pair of tall stones set at a short distance
apart supporting a third stone laid across the top.
Thirdly, the dolmen, which is a single slab of
stone supported by several others arranged in
such a way as to enclose a space or chamber
beneath it. Some English writers apply the term
cromlech to such a structure, quite incorrectly.
Both menhir and dolmen are Breton words, these
two types of megalithic monument being par-
ticularly frequent in Brittany. Menhir is derived
from the Breton men, a stone, and Mr, long ;
similarly dolmen is from dot, a table, and men, a
stone. Some archaeologists also apply the word
dolmen to rectangular chambers roofed with more
than one slab. We have carefully avoided this
practice, always classing such chambers as corridor-

INTRODUCTION

tombs of an elementary type. Fourthly, we have
the corridor-tomb (Ganggrab), which usually
consists of a chamber entered by a gallery or
corridor. In cases where the chamber is no wider
than, and hence indistinguishable from the
corridor, the tomb becomes a long rectangular
gallery, and answers to the French allee couverte
in the strict sense. Fifthly, we come to the
alignement, in which a series of menhirs is arranged
in open lines on some definite system. We shall
find a famous example of this at Morbihan in
Brittany. Sixthly, there is the cromlech (from
crom, curve, and lec'h, a stone), which consists
of a number of menhirs arranged to enclose a
space, circular, elliptical or, in rare cases, rect-
angular.

These are the chief types of megalithic monu-
ment, but there are others which, though clearly
belonging to the same class of structure, show
special forms and are more complicated. They
are in many cases developments of one or more
of the simple types, and will be treated specially
in their proper places. Such monuments are the
nuraghi of Sardinia and the ' temples ' of Malta
and Gozo.

Finally, the rock-hewn sepulchre is often classed
with the megalithic monuments, and it is therefore
frequently mentioned in the following pages.
This is justified by the fact that it generally
occurs in connection with megalithic structures.

ROUGH STONE MONUMENTS

The exact relation in which it stands to them will
be fully discussed in the last chapter.

We have now to consider what may be called
the architectural methods of the megalithic
builders, for although in dealing with such primi-
tive monuments it would perhaps be exaggeration
to speak of a style, yet there were certain princi-
ples which were as carefully and as invariably
observed as were in later days those of the Doric
or the Gothic styles in the countries where they
took root.

The first and most important principle, that on
which the whole of the megalithic construction
may be said to be based, is the use of the ortho-
static block, i.e. the block set up on its edge.
It is clear that in this way each block or slab is
made to provide the maximum of wall area at
the expense of the thickness of the wall. Naturally,
in districts where the rock is of a slabby nature
blocks of a more or less uniform thickness lay
ready to the builders' hand, and the appearance
of the structure was much more finished than it
would be in places where the rock had a less
regular fracture or where shapeless boulders had
to be relied on. The orthostatic slabs were often
deeply sunk into the ground where this consisted
of earth or soft rock ; of the latter case there are
good examples at Stonehenge, where the rock is a
soft chalk. When the ground had an uneven

INTRODUCTION

surface of hard rock, the slabs were set upright on
it and small stones wedged in beneath them to
make them stand firm. Occasionally, as at
Mnaidra and Hagiar Kim, a course of horizontal
blocks set at the foot of the uprights served to
keep them more securely in position. With the
upright block technique went' hand in hand the
roofing of narrow spaces by means of horizontal
slabs laid across the top of the uprights.

The second principle of megalithic architecture
was the use of more or less coursed masonry set
without mortar, each block lying on its side and
not on its edge. It is quite possible that this
principle is less ancient in origin than that of the
orthostatic slab, for it usually occurs in structures
of a more advanced type. Thus in simple and
primitive types of building such as the dolmen
it is most rare to find dry masonry, but in the
advanced corridor-tombs of Ireland, the Giants'
Graves and nuraghi of Sardinia, and in the
' temples ' of Malta this technique is largely used,
often in combination with the upright slab system.
Indeed, this combination is quite typical of the
best megalithic work : a series of uprights is
first set in position, and over this are laid several
horizontal courses of rather smaller stones. We
must note that the dry masonry which we are
describing is still strictly megalithic, as the blocks
used are never small and often of enormous size.

Buildings in which this system is used are

5

ROUGH STONE MONUMENTS

occasionally roofed with slabs, but more often
corbelling is employed. At a certain height each
succeeding course in the wall begins to project
inwards over the last, so that the walls, as it were,
lean together and finally meet to form a false
barrel-vault or a false dome, according as the
structure is rectangular or round. Occasionally,
when the building was wide, it was impossible
to corbel the walls sufficiently to make them meet.
In this case they were corbelled as far as possible
and the open space still left was covered with
long flat slabs.

It has often been commented on as a matter of
wonder that a people living in the stone age, or
at the best possessing a few simple tools of metal,
should have been able to move and place in
position such enormous blocks of stone. With
modern cranes and traction engines all would be
simple, but it might have been thought that in
the stone age such building would be impossible.
Thus, for instance, in the ' temple ' of Hagiar Kim
in Malta, there is one block of stone which measures
21 feet by 9, and must weigh many tons. In
reality there is little that is marvellous in the
moving and setting up of these blocks, for the
tools needed are ready to the hand of every
savage ; but there is something to wonder at
and to admire in the patience displayed and in
the organization necessary to cany out such vast

6

INTRODUCTION

pieces of labour. Great, indeed, must have been
the power of the cult which could combine the
force of hundreds and even thousands of indi-
viduals for long periods of time in the construction
of the great megalithic temples. Perhaps slave
labour played a part in the work, but in any case
it is clear that we are in the presence of strongly
organized governments backed by a powerful
religion which required the building of temples for
the gods and vast tombs for the dead.

Let us consider for a moment what was the
procedure in building a simple megalithic monu-
ment. It was fourfold, for it involved the finding
and possibly the quarrying of the stones, the
moving of them to the desired spot, the erection
of the uprights in their places, and the placing of
the cover-slab or slabs on top of them.

With regard to the first step it is probable that
in most cases the place chosen for a tomb or
cemetery was one in which numbers of great
stones lay on the surface ready to hand. By this
means labour was greatly economized. On the
other hand, there are certainly cases where the
stones were brought long distances in order to
be used. Thus, in Charente in France there is at
La Perotte a block weighing nearly 40 tons which
must have travelled over 18 miles. We have no
evidence as to whether stones were ever actually
quarried. If they were, the means used must
have been the stone axe, fire, and water. It was

ROUGH STONE MONUMENTS

not usual in the older and simpler dolmens to dress
the stones in any way, though in the later and
more complicated structures well-worked blocks
were often used.

The required stones having been found it was
now necessary to move them to the spot. This
could be done in two ways. The first and
simpler is 'that which we see pictured on Egyptian
monuments, such as the tomb of Tahutihotep at
El Bersheh. A rough road of beams is laid in the
required direction, and wooden rollers are placed
under the stone on this road. Large numbers of
men or oxen then drag the stone along by means
of ropes attached to it. Other labourers assist
the work from behind with levers, and replace the
rollers in front of the stone as fast as they pass
out behind. Those who have seen the modern
Arabs in excavation work move huge blocks with
wooden levers and palm-leaf rope will realize that
for the building of the dolmens little was needed
except numbers and time.

The other method of moving the stones is as
follows : a gentle slope of hard earth covered
with wet clay is built with its higher extremity
close beside the block to be moved. As many men
as there is room for stand on each side of the
block, and with levers resting on beams or stones
as fulcra, raise the stone vertically as far as possible.
Other men then fill up the space beneath it with
earth and stones. The process is next repeated

8

INTRODUCTION

with higher fulcra, until the stone is level with the
top of the clay slope, on to which it is then slipped.
With a little help it now slides down the inclined
plane to the bottom. Here a fresh slope is built,
and the whole procedure is gone through again.
The method can even be used on a slight uphill
gradient. It requires less dragging and more
vertical raising than the other, and would thus
be more useful where oxen were unobtainable.

When the stones were once on the spot it is not
hard to imagine how they were set upright with
levers and ropes. The placing of the cover-slab
was, however, a more complicated matter. The
method employed was probably to build a slope
of earth leading up from one side to the already
erected uprights and almost covering them. Up
this the slab could be moved by means of rollers,
ropes, and levers, until it was in position over the
uprights. The slope could then be removed.
If the dolmen was to be partly or wholly covered
with a mound, as some certainly were, it would
not even be necessary to remove the slope.

Roughly speaking, the extension of megalithic
monuments is from Spain to Japan and from
Sweden to Algeria. These are naturally merely
limits, and it must not be supposed that the
regions which lie between them all contain mega-
lithic monuments. More exactly, we find them
in Asia, in Japan, Corea, India, Persia, Syria, and

9

ROUGH STONE MONUMENTS

Palestine. In Africa we have them along the
whole of the north coast, from Tripoli to Morocco ;
inland they are not recorded, except for one
possible example in Egypt and several in the
Soudan. In Europe the distribution of dolmens
and other megalithic monuments is wide. They
occur in the Caucasus and the Crimea, and quite
lately examples have been recorded in Bulgaria.
There are none in Greece, and only a few in Italy,
in the extreme south-east corner. The islands,
however, which lie around and to the south of
Italy afford many examples : Corsica, Sardinia,
Malta, Gozo, Pantelleria, and Lampedusa are
strongholds of the megalithic civilization, and it
is possible that Sicily should be included in the
list. Moving westward we find innumerable
examples in the Spanish Peninsula and in France.
To the north we find them frequent in the British
Isles, Sweden, Denmark, and North Germany ;
they are rarer in Holland and Belgium. Two
examples have been reported from Switzerland.

It is only to be expected that these great
megalithic monuments of a prehistoric age should
excite the wonder and stimulate the imagination
of those who see them. In all countries and at all
times they have been centres of story and legend,
and even at the present day many strange beliefs
concerning them are to be found among the
peasantry who live around them. Salomon

IO

INTRODUCTION

Reinach has written a remarkable essay on this
question, and the following examples are mainly
drawn from the collection he has there made.
The names given to the monuments often show
clearly the ideas with which they are associated in
the minds of the peasants. Thus the Penrith circle
is locally known as " Meg and her Daughters,"
a dolmen in Berkshire is called " Wayland the
Smith's Cave," while in one of the Orkney Isles
is a menhir named " Odin's Stone." In France
many are connected with Gargantua, whose name,
the origin of which is doubtful, stands clearly for
a giant. Thus we find a rock called the " Chair of
Gargantua," a menhir called " Gargantua's Little
Finger," and an allee couverte called " Gargantua's
Tomb." Names indicating connections with fairies,
virgins, witches, dwarfs, devils, saints, druids,
and even historical persons are frequent. Dolmens
are often " houses of dwarfs," a name perhaps
suggested or at least helped by the small holes
cut in some of them ; they are " huts " or " caves
of fairies," they are " kitchens " or " forges of the
devil," while menhirs are called his arrows, and
cromlechs his cauldrons. In France we have
stones of various saints, while in England many
monuments are connected with King Arthur.
A dolmen in Wales is his quoit ; the circle at
Penrith is his round table, and that of Caermarthen
is his park. Both in England and France we
find stones and altars " of the druids " ; in the

ii

ROUGH STONE MONUMENTS

Pyrenees, in Spain, and in Africa there are " graves
of the Gentiles " or " tombs of idolaters " ; in
Aries (France) the allees couvertes are called
" prisons " or " shops of the Saracens," and the
dolmens of the Eastern Pyrenees are locally
known as " huts of the Moors." Dolmens in
India are often " stones of the monkeys," and in
France there are " wolves' altars," " wolves'
houses," and " wolves' tables."

Passing now to more definite beliefs connected
with megalithic monuments, we may notice that
from quite early times they have been — as indeed
they often are still — regarded with fear and
respect, and even worshipped. In certain parts
of France peasants are afraid to shelter under the
dolmens, and never think of approaching them by
night. In early Christian days there must have
been a cult of the menhir, for the councils of
Aries (a.d. 452), of Tours (a.d. 567), and of
Nantes (a.d. 658) all condemn the cult of trees,
springs, and stones. In a.d. 789 Charlemagne
attempted to suppress stone-worship, and to
destroy the stones themselves. In Spain, where,
as in France, megalithic monuments are common,
the councils of Toledo in a.d. 681 and 682 con-
demned the " Worshippers of Stones." Moreover
there are many cases in which a monument itself
bears traces of having been the centre of a cult
in early or medieval times. The best example is
perhaps the dolmen of Saint-Germain-sur-Vienne,

12

INTRODUCTION

which was transformed into a chapel about the
twelfth century. Similar transformations have
been made in Spain. In many cases, too, crosses
have been placed or engraved on menhirs in order
to " Christianize " them.

Remarkable powers and virtues have been
attributed to many of the monuments. One of
the dolmens of Finistere is said to cure rheumatism
in anyone who rubs against the loftiest of its
stones, "and another heals fever patients who sleep
under it. Stones with holes pierced in them are
believed to be peculiarly effective, and it suffices
to pass the diseased limb or, when possible, the
invalid himself through the hole.

Oaths sworn in or near a megalithic monument
have a peculiar sanctity. In Scotland as late as
the year a.d. 1438 " John off Erwyne and Will
Bernardson swor on the Hirdmane Stein before
oure Lorde ye Erie off Orknay and the gentiless
off the cuntre."

Many of the monuments are endowed by the
credulous with life. The menhir du Champ Dolent
sinks an inch every hundred years. Others say
that a piece of it is eaten by the moon each night,
and that when it is completely devoured the Last
Judgment will take place. The stones of Carnac
bathe in the sea once a year, and many of those
of the Perigord leap three times each day at noon.

We have already remarked on the connection
of the monuments with dwarfs, giants, and mythi-

13

ROUGH STONE MONUMENTS

cal personages. There is an excellent example
in our own country in Berkshire. Here when a
horse has cast a shoe the rider must leave it in
front of the dolmen called " The Cave of Wayland
the Smith," placing at the same time a coin on
the cover-stone. He must then retire for a suitable
period, after which he returns to find the horse
shod and the money gone.

'4

CHAPTER II

STONEHENGE AND OTHER GREAT STONE
MONUMENTS IN ENGLAND AND WALES

STONEHENGE, the most famous of our
English megalith ic monuments, has excited
the attention of the historian and the legend-lover
since early times. According to some of the
medieval "historians it was erected by Aurelius
Ambrosius to the memory of a number of British
chiefs whom Hengist and his Saxons treacherously
murdered in A.D. 462. Others add that Ambrosius
himself was buried there. Giraldus Cambrensis,
who wrote in the twelfth century, mingles these
accounts with myth. He says, " There was in
Ireland, in ancient times, a pile of stones worthy
of admiration called the Giants' Dance, because
giants from the remotest part of Africa brought
them to Ireland, and in the plains of Kildare, not
far from the castle of Naas, miraculously set them
up. . . . These stones (according to the British
history) Aurelius Ambrosius, King of the Britons,
procured Merlin by supernatural means to bring
from Ireland to Britain."

From the present ruined state of Stonehenge
it is not possible to state with certainty what was

'5

ROUGH STONE MONUMENTS

the original arrangement, but it is probable that
it was approximately as follows (see frontispiece) :

«

O

0 o®V

<&">

a

a

9

©

£>

C=^

s

^..

9

0

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Fig. I. Plan of Stonehenge in 1901. (After Arckaologia.)
The dotted stones are of porphyritic diabase.

There was an outer circle of about thirty worked
upright stones of square section (Fig. 1). On each
pair of these rested a horizontal block, but only

16

ENGLAND AND WALES

five now remain in position. These ' lintels ' prob-
ably formed a continuous architrave (PI. I). The
diameter of this outer circle is about 97J feet,
inner measurement. The stones used are sarsens
or blocks of sandstone, such as are to be found
tying about in many parts of the district round
Stonehenge.

Well within this circle stood the five huge
trilithons (a-e), arranged in the form of a horse-
shoe with its open side to the north-east. Each
trilithon, as the name implies, consists of three
stones, two of which are uprights, the third being
laid horizontally across the top. The height of
the trilithons varies from 16 to 21 J feet, the lowest
being the two that stand at the open end of the
horseshoe, and the highest that which is at the
apex. Here again all the stones are sarsens and
all are carefully worked. On the top end of each
upright of the trilithons is an accurately cut tenon
which dovetails into two mortices cut one at each
end of the lower surface of the horizontal block.
Each upright of the outer circle had a double
tenon, and the lintels, besides being morticed to
take these tenons, were also dovetailed each into
its two neighbours.

Within the horseshoe and close up to it stand
the famous blue-stones, now twelve in number,
but originally perhaps more. These stones are
not so high as the trilithons, the tallest reaching
only 7} feet. They are nearly all of porphyritic
c 17

ROUGH STONE MONUMENTS

diabase. It has often been asserted that these
blue-stones must have been brought to Stonehenge
from a distance, as they do not occur anywhere
in the district. Some have suggested that they
came from Wales or Cornwall, or even by sea from
Ireland. Now, the recent excavations have
shown that the blue-stones were brought to
Stonehenge in a rough state, and that all the
trimming was done on the spot where they were
erected. It seems unlikely that if they had been
brought from a distance the rough trimming
should not have been done on the spot where they
were found, in order to decrease their weight for
transport. It is therefore possible that the stones
were erratic blocks found near Stonehenge.

Within the horseshoe, and near its apex, lies
the famous "Altar Stone " (A), a block measuring
about 16 feet by 4. Between the horseshoe and
the outer circle another circle of diabase stones is
sometimes said to have existed, but very little
of it now remains.

The whole building is surrounded by a rampart
of earth several feet high, forming a circle about
300 feet in diameter. An avenue still 1200 feet
in length, bordered by two walls of earth, leads
up to the rampart from the north-east. On the
axis of this avenue and nearly at its extremity
stands the upright stone known as the Friar's Heel.

In 1901, in the course of repairing the central
trilithon, careful excavations were carried out over

is

ENGLAND AND WALES

a small area at Stonehenge. More than a hundred
stone implements were found, of which the majority
were flint axes, probably used for dressing the
softer of the sandstone blocks, and also for exca-
vating the chalk into which the uprights were
set. About thirty hammer-stones suitable for
holding in the hand were found. These were
doubtless used for dressing the surface of the
blocks. Most remarkable of all were the ' mauls,'
large boulders weighing from 36 to 64 pounds,
used for smashing blocks and also for removing
large chips from the surfaces. Several antlers of
deer were found, one of which had been worn
down by use as a pickaxe.

These excavations made it clear that the blue-
stones had been shaped on the spot, whereas the
sarsens had been roughly prepared at the place
where they were found, and only finished off on
the spot where they were erected.

What is the date of the erection of Stonehenge ?
The finding of so many implements of flint in the
excavations of 1901 shows that the structure
belongs to a period when flint was still largely
used. The occurrence of a stain of oxide of copper
on a worked block of stone at a depth of 7 feet
does not necessarily prove that the stones were
erected in the bronze age, for the stain may have
been caused by the disintegration of malachite
and not of metallic copper. At the same time,

19

ROUGH STONE MONUMENTS

we must not infer from the frequency of the flint
implements that metal was unknown, for flint
continued to be used far on into the early metal
age. Moreover, flint tools when worn out were
simply thrown aside on the spot, while those of
metal were carefully set apart for sharpening or
re-casting, and are thus seldom found in large
numbers in an excavation. We have, therefore,
no means of accurately determining the date of
Stonehenge ; all that can be said is that the
occurrence of flint in such large quantities points
either to the neolithic age or to a comparatively
early date in the copper or bronze period. It is
unlikely that stone tools would play such a
considerable role in the late bronze or the iron
age.

At the same time it must not be forgotten that
Sir Arthur Evans has spoken in favour of a date
in the first half of the third century B.C. He
believes that the great circles are religious monu-
ments which in form developed out of the round
barrows, and that Stonehenge is therefore much
later than some at least of the round barrows
around it. That it is earlier than others is clear
from the occurrence in some of them of chips
from the sarsen stones. He therefore places its
building late in the round barrow period, and sees
confirmation of this in the fact that the round
barrows which surround the monument are not
grouped in regular fashion around it, as they

20

ENGLAND AND WALES

should have been had they been later in
date.

Many attempts have been made to date the
monuments by means of astronomy. All these
start from the assumption that it was erected in
connection with the worship of the sun, or at least
in order to take certain observations with regard
to the sun. Sir Norman Loclryer noticed that
the avenue at Stonehenge pointed approximately
to. the spot where the sun rises at the midsummer
solstice, and therefore thought that Stonehenge
was erected to observe this midsummer rising.
If he could find the exact direction of the avenue
he would know where the sun rose at midsummer
in the year when the circle was built. From this
he could easily fix the date, for, owing to the
precession of the equinoxes, the point of the mid-
summer rising is continually altering, and the
position for any year being known the date of
that year can be found astronomically. But how
was the precise direction of this very irregular
avenue to be fixed ? The line from the altar stone
to the Friar's Heel, which is popularly supposed
to point to the midsummer rising, has certainly
never done so in the last ten thousand years, and
therefore could not be used as the direction of the
avenue. Eventually Sir Norman decided to use
a line from the centre of the circle to a modern
benchmark on Sidbury Hill, eight miles north-
east of Stonehenge. On this line the sun rose in

21

ROUGH STONE MONUMENTS

1680 B.C. with a possible error of two hundred
years each way : this Sir Norman takes to be
the date of Stonehenge.

Sir Norman's reasoning has been severely
handled by his fellow-astronomer Mr. Hinks, who
points out that the direction chosen for the
avenue is purely arbitrary, since Sidbury Hill has
no connection with Stonehenge at all. Moreover,
Sir Norman determines sunrise for Stonehenge as
being the instant when the edge of the sun's disk
first appears, while in his attempts to date the
Egyptian temple of Karnak he defined it as the
moment when the sun's centre reached the horizon.
We cannot say which alternative the builders
would have chosen, and therefore we cannot
determine the date of building.

Sir Norman Lockyer has since modified his
views. He now argues that the trilithons and
outer circle are later additions to an earlier
temple to which the blue-stones belong. This
earlier temple was made to observe " primarily
but not exclusively the May year," while the later
temple " represented a change of cult, and was
dedicated primarily to the solstitial year." This
view seems to be disproved by the excavations of
1 90 1, which made it clear that the trilithons were
erected before and not after the blue-stones.

Nothing is more likely than that the builders
of the megaliths had some knowledge of the
movements of the sun in connection with the

22

ENGLAND AND WALES

seasons, and that their priests or wise men deter-
mined for them, by observing the sun, the times
of sowing, reaping, etc., as they do among many
savage tribes at the present day. They may
have been worshippers of the sun, and their
temples may have contained ' observation lines '
for determining certain of his movements. But
the attempt to date the monuments from such
lines involves so many assumptions and is affected
by so many disturbing elements that it can never
have a serious value for the archaeologist. The
uncertainty is even greater in the case of temples
supposed to be oriented by some star, for in this
case there is almost always a choice of two or
more bright stars, giving the most divergent results.

y

Fig. 2. Avebury and the Kennet Avenue. (After
Sir R. Colt Hoare. )

Next in importance to Stonehenge comes the
huge but now almost destroyed circle of Avebury
(Fig. 2). Its area is five times as great as that of
St. Peter's in Rome, and a quarter of a million
people could stand within it. It consists in the
first place of a rampart of earth roughly circular

ROUGH STONE MONUMENTS

in form and with a diameter of about 1200 feet.
Within this is a ditch, and close on the inner edge
of this was a circle of about a hundred upright
stones. Within this circle were two pairs of con-
centric circles with their centres slightly east of the
north-and-south diameter of the great circle. The
diameters of the outer circles of these two pairs are
350 and 325 feet respectively. In the centre of
the northern pair was a cover-slab supported by
three uprights, and in the centre of the southern a
single menhir. All the stones used are sarsens,
such as are strewn everywhere over the district.

An avenue flanked by two rows of stones ran
in a south-easterly direction from the rampart
towards the village of Kennet for a distance of
about 1430 yards in a straight line.

At a distance of 1200 yards due south from
Avebury Circle stands the famous artificial mound
called Silbury Hill. It is 552 feet in diameter,
130 in height, and has a flat top 102 feet across.
A pit was driven down into its centre in 1777,
and in 1849 a trench was cut into it from the south
side to the centre, but neither gave any result.
It is quite possible that there are burials in the
mound, whether in megalithic chambers or not.

South-west of Avebury is Hakpen Hill, where
there once stood two concentric ellipses of stones.
A straight avenue is said to have run from these
in a north-westerly direction. Whether these
three monuments near Avebury have any con-

24

ENGLAND AND WALES

nection with one another and, if so, what this
connection is, is unknown.

There are many other circles in England, but
we have only space to mention briefly some of the
more important. At Rollright, in Oxfordshire,
there is a circle ioo feet in diameter with a tall
menhir 50 yards to the north-east. Derbyshire
possesses a famous monument, that of Arbor Low,
where a circle is surrounded by a rampart and
ditch, while that of Stanton Drew in Somerset
consists of a great circle A and two smaller circles
B and C. The line joining the centres of B and A
passes through a menhir called Hauptville's
Quoit away to the north-east, while that which
joins the centres of C and A cuts a group of three
menhirs called The Cove, lying to the south-west.

In Cumberland there are several circles. One
of these, 330 feet in diameter with an outstand-
ing menhir, is known as " Long Meg and her
Daughters." Another, the May borough Circle,
is of much the same size, but consists of a tall
monolith in the centre of a rampart formed en-
tirely of rather small water-worn stones. A
similar circle not far from this is known as King
Arthur's Round Table ; here, however, there is
no monolith. Near Keswick there is a finely
preserved circle, and at Shap there seems to have
existed a large circle with an avenue of stones
running for over a mile to the north.

25

ROUGH STONE MONUMENTS

Cornwall possesses a number of fine monuments.
The most celebrated is the Dance Maen Circle,
which is 76 feet in diameter and has two monoliths
to the north-east, out of sight of the circle, but
stated to be in a straight line with its centre.
Local tradition calls the circle " The Merry
Maidens," and has it that the stones are girls
turned into stones for dancing on Sunday : the
two monoliths are called the Pipers. The three
circles known as the Hurlers lie close together
with their centres nearly in a straight line in the
direction N.N.E. by S.S.W. At Boscawen-un,
near Penzance, is a circle called the Nine Maidens,
and two circles near Tregeseal have the same
name. Another well-known circle in Cornwall is
called the Stripple Stones : the circle stands on a
platform of earth surrounded by a ditch, outside
which is a rampart. In the centre is a menhir
12 feet in height.

At Merivale, in Somersetshire, there are the
remains of a small circle, to the north of which
lie two almost parallel double lines of menhirs,
running about E.N.E. by W.S.W., the more
southerly of the two lines overlapping the other
at both extremities.

With what purpose were these great circles
erected ? We have already mentioned the curious
belief of Geoffrey of Monmouth with regard to
Stonehenge, and we may pass on to more modern

26

ENGLAND AND WALES

theories. James I was once taken to see Stone-
henge when on a visit to the Earl of Pembroke
at Wilton. He was so interested that he ordered
his architect Inigo Jones to enquire into its date
and purpose. The architect's conclusion was that
it was a Roman temple " dedicated to the god
Caelus and built after the Tuscan order."

Many years later Dr. Stukeley started a theory
which has not entirely been abandoned at the
present day. For him Stonehenge and other stone
circles were temples of the druids. This was in
itself by no means a ridiculous theory, but Stukeley
went further than this. Relying on a quaint story
in Pliny wherein the druids of Gaul are said to
use as a charm a certain magic egg manufactured
by snakes, he imagined that the druids were
serpent-worshippers, and essayed to see serpents
even in the forms of their temples. Thus in the
Avebury group the circle on Hakpen Hill was
for him the head of a snake and its avenue part
of the body. The Avebury circles were coils in
the body, which was completed by the addition
of imaginary stones and avenues. He also at-
tempted with even less success to see the form of
a serpent in other British circle groups.

The druids, as we gather from the rather scanty
references in Gesar and other Roman authors,
were priests of the Celts in Gaul. Suetonius
further speaks of druids in Anglesey, and tradition
has it that in Wales and Ireland there were druids

27

ROUGH STONE MONUMENTS

in pre-Christian times. But that druids ever
existed in England or in a tithe of the places in
which megalithic circles and other monuments
occur is unlikely. At the same time, it is not
impossible that some of the circles of Ireland,
Wales, and France were afterwards used by the
druids as suitable places for meeting and preaching.

Fergusson in his great work Rude Stone Monu-
ments held a remarkable view as to the purpose
of the British stone circles. He believed that they
were partly Roman in date, and that some of
them at least marked the scene of battles fought
by King Arthur against the Saxons. Thus, for
example, he says with regard to Avebury, " I
feel it will come eventually to be acknowledged
that those who fell in Arthur's twelfth and greatest
battle were buried in the ring at Avebury, and that
those who survived raised these stones and the
mound of Silbury in the vain hope that they
would convey to their latest posterity the memory
of their prowess." It is hardly necessary to take
this view seriously nowadays. Stonehenge, which
Fergusson attributes to the same late era, has
been proved by excavation to be prehistoric in
origin, and with it naturally go the rest of the
megalithic circles of England, except where there
is any certain proof to the contrary.

The most probable theory is that the circles
are religious monuments of some kind. What the
nature of the worship carried on in them was it is

28

ENGLAND AND WALES

quite impossible to determine. It may be that
some at least were built near the graves of deified
heroes to whose worship they were consecrated.
On the other hand, it is possible that they were
temples dedicated to the sun or to others of the
heavenly bodies. Whether they served for the
taking of astronomical observations or not is a
question which cannot be decided with certainty,
though the frequency with which menhirs occur
in directions roughly north-east of the circles is
considered by some as a sign of connection with
the watching of solar phenomena.

Dolmens of simple type are not common in
England, though they occur with comparative
frequency in Wales, where the best known are
the so-called Arthur's Quoit near Swansea, the
dolmen of Pentre Ifan in Pembrokeshire, and that
of Plas Newydd on the Menai Strait : in Anglesey
they are quite common. In England we have
numerous examples in Cornwall, especially west
of Falmouth, among which are Chun Quoit and
Lanvon Ouoit. There are dolmens at Chagford
and Drewsteignton in Devonshire, and there is
one near the Rollright Circle in Oxfordshire.

Many of the so-called cromlechs of England
are not true dolmens, but the remains of tombs
of more complicated types. Thus the famous
Kit's Coty House in Kent was certainly not a
dolmen, though it is now impossible to say what

29

ROUGH STONE MONUMENTS

its form was. Wayland the Smith's Cave was
probably a three-chambered corridor-tomb covered
with a mound. The famous Men-an-tol in Corn-
wall may well be all that is left of a chamber-
tomb of some kind. It is a slab about 3J feet
square, in which is a hole ij feet in diameter.
There are other stones standing or lying around it.
It is known to the peasants as the Crickstone,
for it was said to cure sufferers from rickets or
crick in the back if they passed nine times through
the hole in a direction against the sun. The Isle
of Man possesses a fine sepulchral monument on
Meayll Hill. It consist of six T-shaped chamber-
tombs arranged in a circle with entrances to the
north and south. There is also a corridor-tomb,
known as King Orry's Grave, at Laxey, and
another with a semicircular facade at Maughold.

Among the megalithic monuments of our
islands the chambered barrows hold an important
place. It is well known that in the neolithic
period the dead in certain parts of England were
buried under mounds of not circular but elongated
shape. These graves are commonest in Wiltshire
and the surrounding counties of Dorsetshire,
Somersetshire, and Gloucestershire. A few exist
in other counties. Some contain no chamber,
while others contain a structure of the megalithic
type. It is with these latter that we have here to
deal. Chambered long barrows are most frequent

30

ENGLAND AND WALES

a

6

Fig. 3. (a) — Barrow at Stoney Littleton, Somersetshire.
(b) — Barrow at Rodmarton, Gloucestershire, (c) — Chambers
of barrow at Uley, Gloucestershire. (After Thurnam, Arch-
<zologia% XLII.)

31

ROUGH STONE MONUMENTS V£

in Wiltshire, though they do occur inj other
counties, as, for example, ^Su^ldn^fe^«sIiiLe< where
the famous Cave of Wayland the Smith is cer-
tainly the remains of a barrow of this kind. In
Derbyshire and Staffordshire a type of chambered
mound does occur, but it seems uncertain from
the description given whether it is round or
elongated.

Turning first to the Wiltshire and Gloucester-
shire group of barrows we find that they are usually
from 120 to 200 feet in length and from 30 to 60
in breadth. In some cases there is a wall of dry
stone-masonry around the foot of the mound and
outside this a ditch. The megalithic chambers
within the mound are of three types. In the
first there is a central gallery entering the mound
at its thicker end and leading to a chamber or
series of chambers (Fig. 3, a and c). Where this
gallery enters the mound there is a cusp-shaped
break in the outline of the mound as marked by
the dry walling, and the entrance is closed by a
stone block. The chambers are formed of large
slabs set up on edge. Occasionally there are
spaces between successive slabs, and these are
filled up with dry masonry. The roof is made
either by laying large slabs across the tops of the
sides or by corbelling with smaller slabs as at
Stoney Littleton.

In the second type of chambered barrow there
is no central corridor, but chambers are built in

32

ENGLAND AND WALES

opposite pairs on the outside edge of the mound
and opening outwards (Fig. 3, b). The two best
known examples of this are the tumuli of Avening
and of Rodmarton.

In the third type of barrow there is no chamber
connected with the outside, but its place is taken
by several dolmens — so small as to be mere cists —
within the mound.

The burials in these barrows seem to have been
without exception inhumations. The body was
placed in the crouched position, either sitting up
or reclining. In an untouched chamber at Rod-
marton were found as many as thirteen bodies,
and in the eastern chamber at Charlton's Abbott
there were twelve. With the bodies lay pottery,
vases, and implements of flint and bone.

33

CHAPTER III

MEGALITHIC MONUMENTS IN SCOTLAND

AND IRELAND

THE stone circles of Scotland have been
divided into three types — the Western
Scottish, consisting of a rather irregular ring or
pair of concentric rings ; the Inverness type, in
which a chamber entered by a straight passage
is covered by a round tumulus with a retaining
wall of stone, the whole being surrounded b}^ a
regular stone circle ; and the Aberdeen type,
which is similar to the last, but lias a ' recum-
bent ' stone between two of the uprights of its
outer circle.

The first type occurs in the southern counties,
in the islands of the west and north coasts, and
also extends into Argyll and Perthshire. The
most famous example is the Callernish Circle in
the Isle of Lewis. The circle is formed by
thirteen stones from 12 to 15 feet high, and its
centre is marked by an upright 17 feet high. From
the circle extends a line of four stones to the east
and another to the west. To the south runs a
line of five uprights and several fallen stones,
and to the N.N.E. runs a double line, forming

34

SCOTLAND AND IRELAND

as it were an avenue with nine stones on one side
and ten on the other, but having no entrance to
the circle. Inside the circle, between the central
stone and the east side of the ring, is what is
described as a cruciform grave with three cells
under a low tumulus. In this tomb were found
fragments of human bone apparently burnt.
It has been suggested that the tomb is not part
of the original structure, but was added later.

The native tradition about this circle as repeated
by Martin in 1700 was that it was a druidical
place of worship, and that the chief druid stood
near the central stone to address the assembled
people. This tradition seems to have now dis-
appeared.

In the island of Arran, between Brodick and
Lamlash, is a damaged circle 21 feet in diameter.
At a distance of 60 feet from its circumference in a
direction 35 ° east of south is a stone 4 feet
high. In the centre of the circle was found a
cist cut in the underlying rock containing bluish
earth and pieces of bone. Above were an imple-
ment and some fragments of flint.

On the other side of the island there were still
in i860 remains of eight circles, five of sandstone
and three of granite, quite close to one another.
The diameter of the largest was 63 feet, and the
highest stone reached 18 feet. One of them was
a double ring. In four of them were found cists
containing pottery, flint arrow-heads, a piece of

35

ROUGH STONE MONUMENTS

a bronze pin, and some fragments of bone. Others
appear to contain no cists.

In the other islands of the west coast few circles
seem to remain ; there are, however, one at
Kirkabrost in Skye, and another at Kingarth in
Bute.

At Stromness in Orkney is the famous circle
called the Ring of Brogar. It originally con-
sisted of sixty stones forming a circle 340 feet in
diameter, outside which was a ditch 29 feet wide.
In a direction 6o° east of south from the centre,
and at a distance of 63 chains, is a standing stone
called the Watchstone, 18 feet high, and 42 or 43
chains further on in the same line is a second
stone, the Barnstone, 15 feet high. To the left
of this line are two stones apparently placed at
random, and to the right are the few remaining
blocks of the Ring of Stenness, somewhere to the
north of which was the celebrated pierced block
called the " Stone of Odin," destroyed early in
the last century. At a distance of 42 or 43 chains
to the north-east of the Barnstone lies the tumulus
of Maeshowe. This tumulus conceals a long
gallery leading into a rectangular chamber. The
walls of this latter are built of horizontal courses
of stones, except at the corners, where there are
tall, vertically-placed slabs. The chamber has
three niches or recesses, one on each of its closed
sides. The roof is formed by corbelling the walls
and finishing oft with slabs laid across. If one

36

SCOTLAND AND IRELAND

sits within the chamber and looks in a direct line
along the passage one sees the Barnstone.

A series of measurements and alignments have
been taken to connect the ' Maeshowe tumulus
with the Ring of Brogar. Thus we have already
seen that the distance from the Barnstone to the
Watchstone is the same as from the Barnstone
to the tumulus. Moreover, the Watchstone is
equidistant from the ring and from the tumulus.
Again, a line from the Barnstone to the tumulus
passes through the point of the midsummer sun-
rise and also, on the other horizon, through the
point of the setting sun ten days before the
winter solstice ; the line from the Watchstone to
the Brogar Ring marks the setting of the sun at
the Beltane festival in May and its rising ten days
before the winter solstice, while the line from
Maeshowe to the Watchstone is in the line of the
equinoctial rising and setting. These alignments
are the work of Mr. Magnus Spence ; readers
must choose what importance they will assign to
them.

The Inverness type of circle is entirely different
from that of which we have been speaking. The
finest examples were at Clava, seven miles from
Inverness, where fifty years ago there were eight
still in existence. One of these is still partly
preserved. It consists of a circle ioo feet in
diameter consisting of twelve stones. Within
this is a cairn of stones with a circular retaining

37

ROUGH STONE MONUMENTS

wall of stone blocks 2 or 3 feet high. The cairn
originally covered a circular stone chamber 12 J
feet in diameter entered by a straight passage
on its south-west side. In other words, the In-
verness monuments are simply chamber-tombs
covered with a cairn and surrounded by a circle.

Around Aberdeen we find the third type of
circle. It consists of a cist-tomb covered by a
low mound, often with a retaining wall of small
blocks, but there is no entrance passage leading
into the cist. Outside the whole is a circle of
large upright blocks with this peculiarity, that
between the two highest — generally to the south
or slightly east of south — lies a long block on its
side, occupying the whole interval between them.
The uprights nearest this ' recumbent ' block are
the tallest in the circle, and the size of the rest
decreases towards the north. Of thirty circles
known near Aberdeen twenty-six still possess the
' recumbent ' stone, and in others it may originally
have existed.

Passing now to monuments of more definitely
sepulchral type we find that the dolmen is not
frequent in Scotland, though several are known
in the lowlands and in part of Argyllshire.

To the long barrows of England answer in part
at least the chambered cairns of Caithness and
the Orkneys. The best known type is a long
rectangular horned cairn (Fig. 4), of which there

38

SCOTLAND AND IRELAND

are two fine examples near Yarhouse. The largest
is 240 feet in length. The chamber is circular,
and roofed partly by corbelling and partly by
a large slab. In the cairn of Get we have a shorter
and wider example of the horned type. Another

Fig. 4. Horned tumulus at Garrywhin, Caithness.
(After Montelius.)

type is circular or elliptical. In a cairn of this
sort at Camster an iron knife was found. On the
Holm of Papa-Westra in the Orkneys there is an
elliptical cairn of this kind containing a long
rectangular chamber running along its major
axis with seven small circular niches opening off
it. The entrance passage lies on the minor axis
of the barrow.

ROUGH STONE MONUMENTS

The megalithic monuments of Ireland are
extremely numerous, and are found in almost
every part of the country. They offer a particular
interest from the fact that though they are of few
different types they display all the stages by
which the more complex were developed from the
more simple. It must be remembered that most
if not all the monuments we shall describe were
originally covered by mounds of earth, though
in most cases these have disappeared.

The simple dolmen is found in almost all parts
of the country. Its single cover-slab is supported
by a varying number of uprights, sometimes as
few as three, oftener four or more. It is of great

CZD"

Fig. 5. Type-plans of (a) the round dolmen ; (b) the
dolmen with portico ; [c) the rectangular dolmen.

importance to notice the fact that here in Ireland,
as elsewhere in the megalithic area, e.g. Sardinia,
we have the round and rectangular dolmens in
juxtaposition (Fig. 5, a and c).

Occasionally one of the end-blocks of the dolmen

40

SCOTLAND AND IRELAND

instead of just closing up the space between the
two nearest side-blocks is pushed back between
them so as to form with them a small three-sided
portico outside the chamber, but still under the
shelter of the cover-slab (Fig. 5, b). A good
example of this exists at Gaulstown, Waterford,
where a table-stone weighing 6 tons rests on six
uprights, three of which form the little portico
just described. The famous dolmen of Car rick-
glass, Sligo, is a still more developed example of
this type. Here the chamber is an accurate rect-
angle, and the portico is formed by adding two
side-slabs outside one of the end-slabs, but still
under the cover. This last is a remarkable block
of limestone weighing about 70 tons. This form
of tomb is without doubt a link between the
simple dolmen and the corridor-tomb. The
portico was at first built under the slab by pushing
an end-stone inwards. Then external side-stones
formed the portico, though still under the slab.
The next move was to construct the portico outside
the slab. The portico then needed a roof, and the
addition of a second cover to provide it completed
the transition to the simpler corridor- tomb. In
many cases the Irish simple dolmens were sur-
rounded by a circle of upright stones. At Carrow-
more, Sligo, there seems to have been a veritable
cemetery of dolmen-tombs, each of which has
one or more circles around it, the outermost being
120 feet in diameter. The tombs in these Carrow-

41

ROUGH STONE MONUMENTS

more circles were not always simple dolmens,
but often corridor-tombs of more or less com-
plicated types. Their excavation has not given
very definite results. In many cases human
bones have been found in considerable quantities,
sometimes in a calcined condition ; but there is
no real evidence to show that cremation was the
burial rite practised. The calcination of human
bones may well have been caused by the lighting
of fires in the tomb, either at some funeral cere-
mony, or in even later days, when the place was
used as a shelter for peasants. A few poor flints
were found and a little pottery, together with
many bones of animals and some pins and borers
of bone. The most important find made, how-
ever, was a small conical button made of bone
with two holes pierced in its flat side and meeting
in the middle. It is a type which occurs in Europe
only at the period of transition from the age of
stone to that of bronze, and usually in connection
with megalithic monuments.

Fig. 6. Type-plan of the simple rectangular
corridor-tomb or altie couverte.

We pass on now to consider the simplest form

42

SCOTLAND AND IRELAND

of corridor-tomb, that in which there are several
cover-slabs, but no separate chamber (Fig. 6).
These tombs occur in most parts of Ireland. At
Carrick-a-Dhirra, County Waterford, there is a
perfect example of the most simple type. The
tomb is exactly rectangular and lies east and west,
with a length of 19 feet and a breadth of 7 J. At
each end is a single upright, and each long side
consists of seven. The chamber thus formed is
roofed by five slabs. The whole was surrounded
by a circle of about twenty-six stones, and no
doubt the chamber was originally covered by a
mound. In a somewhat similar example at
Coolback, Fermanagh, the remains of the elliptical
cairn are still visible.

But in most cases the plan of the corridor- tomb
is complicated by a kind of outer lining of blocks
which was added to it. Most of the monuments
are so damaged that it is difficult to see what the
exact form of this lining was. Whether it merely
consisted of a line of upright blocks close around
the sides of the chamber or whether these sup-
ported some further structure which covered up
the whole chamber it is difficult to say. In some
cases the roof-slab actually covers the outer line
of blocks, and here it seems certain that this
outer line served simply to reinforce the chamber
walls, the space between being filled with earth
or rubble. However, at Labbamologa, County
Cork, is a tomb called Leaba Callighe, in which

43

ROUGH STONE MONUMENTS

this was certainly not the case. The length of
the whole monument is about 42 feet. The slabs
cover the inner walls of the chamber, but not
the outer lining : this last forms a kind of outer
shell to the whole monument. It is shaped roughly
like a ship, and runs to a point at the east end,
thus representing the bow. The west end is
damaged, but may have been pointed like the
east. The whole reminds one very forcibly of
the naus of the Balearic Isles and the Giants'
Graves of Sardinia. Occasionally the corridor-
tomb has a kind of portico at its west end.

Fig. 7. Type-plan of wedge-shaped tomb. The roof
slabs are two or more in number.

In Munster the corridor- tomb takes a peculiar
form (Fig. 7). It lies roughly east and west, and
its two long sides are placed at a slight angle to one
another in such a way that the west end is broader
than the east. In a good example of this at
Keamcorravooly, County Cork, there are two large
capstones and the walls consist of double rows of

44

SCOTLAND AND IRELAND

slabs, the outer being still beneath the cover-
slabs. On the upper surface of the covers
are several small cup-shaped hollows, some of
which at least have been produced artificially.

These wedge-shaped structures are of remark-
able interest, for exactly the same broadening
of the west end is found in Scandinavia, in the
Hiinenbetter of Holland, in the corridor-tombs of
Portugal, and in the dolmens of the Deccan in
India.

In some Irish tombs the corridor leads to a well-
defined chamber. In a curious tomb at Carrickard,
Sligo, the chamber was rectangular and lay across
the end of the corridor in such a way as to form
a T. The whole seems to have been covered with
an oval mound. In another at Highwood in the
same count}' a long corridor joins two small
circular chambers, the total length being 44 feet.
The corridor was once divided into four sections
by cross-slabs. The cairn which covered this
tomb was triangular in form.

In the county of Meath, in the parish of Lough
Crew, is a remarkable series of stone cairns ex-
tending for three miles along the Slieve-na-
Callighe Hills. These cairns conceal chamber-
tombs. The cairns themselves are roughly
circular, and the largest have a circle of upright
blocks round the base. The chambers are built
ofjjupright slabs and are roofed by corbelling.
Cairn H covered a corridor leading to a chamber

45

ROUGH STONE MONUMENTS

and opening off on each side into a side-chamber,
the whole group thus being cruciform. In these
chambers were found human remains and objects
of flint, bone, earthenware, amber, glass, bronze,
and iron. Cairn L had a central corridor from
which opened off seven chambers in a very irregular
fashion. Cairn T consisted of a corridor leading
to a fine octagonal chamber with small chambers
off it on three sides.

The chief interest of these tombs lies in the
remarkable designs engraved on some of the stones
of the passages and chambers. They are fairly
deeply cut with a rather sharp implement, prob-
ably a metal chisel. They are arranged in the
most arbitrary way on the stones and are often
crowded together in masses. There is no attempt
to depict scenes of any kind, nor is there, indeed,
any example of animal life. In fact, the designs
seem to be purely ornamental. The most frequent
elements of design are cup-shaped hollows, con-
centric circles or ovals, star-shaped figures,
circles with emanating rays, spirals, chevrons,
reticulated figures, parallel straight or curved
lines. There seems to be no clue as to the meaning
of these designs. They may have been merely
ornamental, though this is hardly likely.

At New Grange, near Drogheda, there is a
similar series of tumuli, one of which has become
famous (Fig. 8). It consists of a huge mound of
stones 280 feet in diameter surrounded by a circle

46

SCOTLAND AND IRELAND

of upright blocks. Access to the corridor is gained

o
U

00

6

from the south-east side. This corridor leads to a
chamber with three divisions, so that corridor

47

ROUGH STONE MONUMENTS

and chambers together form a cross with a long
shaft. The walls are formed of rough slabs set
upright. In the passage the roof is of slabs laid
right across, but the roof of the chamber is formed
by corbelling. On the floor of each division of the
chamber was found a stone basin.

Around the edge of the mound runs an enclosure
wall of stones lying on the ground edge to edge.
A few of these are sculptured. The finest is a
great stone which lies in front of the entrance
and shows a well-arranged design of spirals and
lozenges. There are also engravings on one of the
stones of the chambers. These designs are in
general more skilful than those of Lough Crew.
They consist mainly of chevrons, lozenges, spirals,
and triangles.

The monuments we have so far described are
all tombs. Ireland also possesses several stone
circles. The largest are situated round Lough
Gur, 10 or 12 miles south of Limerick. There
was at one time a fine circle west of Lough Gur
at Rockbarton, but it is now destroyed. On the
eastern edge of the lough is a double concentric
ring of stones, the diameter of the inner circle
being about 100 feet. The rings are 6 feet apart,
and the space between them is filled up with
earth. In 1869 an excavation was made within
the circle and revealed some human remains,
mostly those of children from six to eight years old.

48

SCOTLAND AND IRELAND

Further north is a remarkable group of monu-
ments known as the Carrigalla circles. The first
is a plain circle (L) 33 or 34 feet in diameter,
composed of twenty-eight stones. The space
within them is filled up with earth to form a
raised platform. At a distance of 75 feet are two
concentric circles, diameters 155 and 184 feet
respectively, made of stones 5 or 6 feet high. The
space between the two circles is filled with earth.
Within these is a third concentric circle about
48 feet in diameter made of stones of the same
size. This group of three concentric circles we
will call M. The line joining the centres of L and
M runs in a direction of 290 or 300 west of north
and passes through a stone (N) 8 feet high standing
on the top of a ridge 2500 feet away. There are
two other stones more to the west (O and P) in
such a position that the line joining them (41 °
west of north) passes through the centre of M,
from which they are distant 860 and 1450 feet
respectively. Further, a line through the centre
of L and a great standing stone (0) 2480 feet from
it in a direction io° east of south passes through
the highest point in the district, 1615 feet away
and 492 feet in height.

Mr. Lewis compares this group of monuments
with that of Stanton Drew in Somersetshire. In
both a line joining the centre of two circles passes
through a single stone in a northerly direction,
and there is in both a fixed line from the centre

e 49

ROUGH STONE MONUMENTS

of the larger circle. Captain Boyle Somerville,
r.n., finds that the line 290 or 300 west of north
would mark the setting of Capella in B.C. 1600,
or Arcturus 500 B.C. ; he adds that the direction
41 ° west of north would suit Capella in 2500 B.C.
or Castor in 2000 B.C.

On the west side of Lough Gur is another
group of monuments. There is in the first place
a circle 55 feet in diameter. On a line 35 ° east
of north from this is a stone 10 feet high, and the
same line produced strikes a prominent hill-top.
Somewhere to the south-west of this circle, perhaps
with its centre in the line just described, lay a
second circle between 150 and 170 feet in dia-
meter, destroyed in 1870. Three other stones
mentioned by early writers as being near the
circles have now disappeared. The direction 35 °
east of north is the same as that of the King-
stone with regard to the Rollright Circle in Oxford-
shire. This line, allowing a height of 30 for the
horizon, would, according to Sir Norman Lockyer,
have struck the rising points of Capella in 1700
B.C. and Arcturus in 500 B.C.

To the south of the destroyed circle is another
about 150 to 155 feet in diameter, with stones of
over 5 feet in height set close together. Earth is
piled up outside them to form a bank 30 feet wide.
There is an entrance 3 feet wide in a direction
590 east of north from the centre of the circle.
There is said to have been at one time a cromlech

50

SCOTLAND AND IRELAND

ioo feet wide due south of the circle and connected
with it by a paved way. Sir Norman Lockyer
thinks that the position of the doorway is connected
with observation of the sun's rising in May.
Moreover, the tallest stone of the circle, 9 feet
high, is 300 east of north from the centre, a direc-
tion which according to him points to the rising
of Capella in 1950 B.C. and Arcturus in 280 B.C.

51

CHAPTER IV
THE SCANDINAVIAN MEGALITHIC AREA

I

N Scandinavia megalithic monuments abound.
They have been studied with unusual care
from quite an early date in the history of archaeo-
logy, and classified in the order of their develop-
ment. The earliest type appears to be the simple
dolmen with either four or five sides and a very
rough cover-slab. This and the upper part of the
sides remained uncovered by the mound of earth
which was always heaped round the tomb. In
later times the dolmen became more regularly
rectangular in shape, and only its roof-block
appeared above the mound. Contemporary with
this later form of dolmen were several other types
of tomb. One was simply the earlier dolmen with
one side open and in front of it a sort of portico or
elementary corridor formed by two upright slabs
with no roofing (cf. the Irish type, Fig. 5, b).
This quickly developed into the true corridor-
tomb, which had at first a small round chamber
with one or two cover-slabs, a short corridor, and
a round or rectangular mound. Later types
have an oval chamber (Fig. 9) with from one to
four cover-slabs or a rectangular chamber with a

52

SCANDINAVIA

long corridor and a circular mound. Finally we
reach a type where thin slabs are used in the
construction, and the mound completely covers
the cap-stones : here the corridor leads out from
one of the short ends of the rectangular chamber.
The earliest of these types in point of view of
development, the true dolmen, is common both in
Denmark and in South Sweden ; only one ex-
ample exists in Norway. In Sweden it is never
found far from the sea-coast.

Fig. 9. Corridor-tomb, Ottagarden, Sweden.
(Montelius, Orient und Eitropa.)

The corridor-tomb is also frequent in Denmark
and Sweden, though it is unknown in Norway.
In Sweden it is, like all megalithic monuments,
confined to the south of the country. Of the early
transition type with elementary corridor there are
fine examples at Herrestrup in Denmark and
Torebo in Sweden. A tomb at Sjobol in Sweden
where the corridor, consisting of only two up-
rights, is covered in with two roof-slabs instead
of being left open, shows very clearly the

53

ROUGH STONE MONUMENTS

transition to the corridor-tomb proper, in which
the entrance passage consists of at least four
uprights, two on each side. Of this there are
numerous fine examples. A tomb of this type at
Broholm in Denmark has a roughly circular
chamber separated from the corridor by a kind of
threshold-stone. Another at Tyfta in Sweden is
remarkable for its curious construction, the
uprights being set rather apart from one another
and the spaces between filled up with dry masonry
of small stones. Possibly there were not sufficient
large blocks at hand to construct a tomb of the
required size.

The still later type consisting of a rectangular
chamber with a long corridor leading out of one
of its long sides often attains to very imposing
dimensions. In Westgothland, a province of
Sweden, there are fine examples with walls of
limestone and often roofs of granite visible above
the surface of the mound. The largest of these
tombs is that of Karleby near Falkoping. In
another at Axevalla Heath were found nineteen
bodies seated round the wall of the chamber,
each in a separate small cist of stone slabs. The
position of the bodies in the Scandinavian graves
is rather variable, both the outstretched and the
contracted posture being used. It is usual to
find many bodies in the same tomb, often as
many as twenty or thirty : in that of Borreby
on the island of Seeland were found seventy

54

SCANDINAVIA

skeletons, all of children of from two to eighteen
years of age.

In Denmark these rectangular tombs occa-
sionally have one or more small round niches.
In 1837 a large tomb was excavated at Lundhoj
on Jutland, which had a circular niche opposite
to the entrance. The niche had a threshold-stone,
and the two uprights of the main chamber which
lay on either side of this had been crudely engraved
with designs, among which were a man, an animal,
and a circle with a pair of diameters marked.
Little was found in the chamber, and only some
bones and a pot in the niche.

In Denmark often occur mounds which contain
two or more tombs, usually of the same form,
each with its separate entrance passage. At the
entrance of the chamber there is sometimes a
well-worked framework into which fitted a door
of stone or wood.

The late type in which the corridor leads out
of one of the narrow ends of the chamber is
represented in both Sweden and Denmark. From
this may be derived the rather unusual types in
which the corridor has become indistinguishable
from the chamber or forms a sort of antechamber
to it. An example of the former type at Knyttkarr
in Sweden is wider at one end than at the other,
and has an outer coating of stone slabs. It
resembles very closely the wedge-shaped tombs of
Munster (cf. Fig. 7).

55

ROUGH STONE MONUMENTS

In Germany megalithic monuments are not
infrequent, but they are practically confined to
the northern part of the country. They extend
as far east as Konigsberg and as far west as the
borders of Holland. They are very frequent in
Holstein, Mecklenburg, and Hanover. There are
even examples in Prussian Saxony, but in South
Germany they cease entirely. Keller in one edition
of his Lake Dwellings figures two supposed dolmens
north of Lake Pfaffikon in Switzerland, but we
have no details with regard to them.

The true dolmen is extremely rare in Germany,
and only occurs in small groups in particular
localities. The corridor-tomb with a distinct
chamber is also very exceptional, especially east
of the Elbe. The most usual type of megalithic
tomb is that known as the HUnenbett or Ricsenbett.
The latter name means Giants' Bed, and it seems
probable that the former should be similarly
translated, despite the suggested connection with
the Huns, for a word Hunen has been in use in
North Germany for several centuries with the
meaning of giants. A HUnenbett consists of a
rectangular (rarely oval or round) hill of earth
covering a megalithic tomb. This is a simple
elongated rectangle in shape, made of upright
blocks and roofed with two or more cover-slabs.
The great HUnenbett or Grewismiihlen in Mecklen-
burg has a mound measuring 150 feet by 36 with
a height of 5 feet. On the edge of the mound

56

SCANDINAVIA

are arranged forty-eight tall upright blocks of

stone.

The Hi'menbetter of the Altmark are among
the best known and explored. Here the corridors
are usually about 20 feet long, though in rare
cases they reach a length of 40 feet. Each is filled
with clean sand up to two- thirds of its height,
and on this lie the bodies and their funeral deposit.
The bodies must have been laid flat, though not
necessarily in an extended position, as there was
not room above the sand for them to have been
seated upright. Various implements of flint have
been found in the tombs together with stone
hammers and vases of pottery. There is no certain
instance of the finding of metal.

A book printed by John Picardt at Amsterdam
in 1660 contains quaint pictures of giants and
dwarfs engaged in the building of a megalithic
monument which is clearly a Hunenbett. According
to tradition the giants, after employing the labour
of the dwarfs, proceeded to devour them. H linen-
better similar to those shown in Picardt's illustra-
tions are still to be seen in Holland, but only in
the north, where over fifty are known. They are
of elongated rectangular form, built of upright
blocks, and roofed with from two to ten cover-
slabs. They all widen slightly towards the west
end. The most perfect example still remaining
is that of Tinaarloo, and the largest is that of

57

ROUGH STONE MONUMENTS

Borger, which contains forty-five blocks, of which
ten are cap-stones. Several Hiinenbetler have been
excavated. In them are found pottery vases,
flint celts, axes and hammers of grey granite,
basalt, and jade.

Belgium possesses several true dolmens, of
which the best known is that called La Pierre du
Diable on the right bank of the Meuse. Near
Luttich are two simple corridor-tombs, each with
a round hole in one of the end-slabs and a small
portico outside it.

58

CHAPTER V
FRANCE, SPAIN, AND PORTUGAL

FRANCE contains large numbers of megalithic
monuments. Of dolmens and corridor-
tombs no less than 4458 have been recorded. In
the east and south-east they are rare, but they
abound over a wide strip running from the Breton
coasts of the English Channel to the Mediterranean
shores of Herault and Gard. In 1901 Mortillef
counted 6192 menhirs, including those which
formed parts of alignements and cromlechs.
Several of these attain to a great size. That to
Locmariaquer (Morbihan), now unfortunately
fallen and broken, measured over 60 feet in height,
being thus not much shorter than the Egyptian
obelisk which stands in the Place de la Concorde
in Paris.

Passing now to combinations of menhirs in
groups, we must first mention the remarkable
alignements of Brittany, of which the most famous
are those of Carnac. They run east and west over
a distance of 3300 yards, but the line is broken
at two points in such a way that the whole forms
three groups. The most westerly, that of Menec,
consists of eleven lines of menhirs and a cromlech,

59

ROUGH STONE MONUMENTS

the total number of stones standing being 1169,
the tallest of which is 13 feet in height. The
central group, that of Kermario, consists of 982
stones arranged in ten straight lines, while the
most easterly, that of Kerlescan, is formed by
579 menhirs, 39 of which form a rectangular
enclosure.

There are other alignements in Brittany, of which
the most important is that of Erdeven, com-
prising 1 1 29 stones arranged in ten lines. Outside
Brittany alignements are unusual, but a fine
example, now ruined, is said to have existed at
Saint Pantaleon north of Autun. In the fields
around it are found large quantities of polished
stone axes with knives, scrapers, and arrow-heads
of flint.

We have already noticed the cromlechs which
form part of the alignements of Brittany. There
are other examples in France. At Er-Lanic are
two circles touching one another, the lower of
which is covered by the sea even at low tide.
Excavations carried out within the circles brought
to light rough pottery and axes of polished stone.
Two fine circles at Can de Ceyrac (Gard) have
diameters of about 100 yards, and are formed of
stones about 3 feet high. Each has a short
entrance avenue which narrows as it approaches
the circle, and in the centre of each rises a trilithon
of rough stones.

Of the definitely sepulchral monuments the

60

FRANCE, SPAIN, AND PORTUGAL

dolmen is common in all parts of the French
megalithic area. It will suffice to mention the
magnificent example known as the Table des
Marchands at Locmariaquer. Perhaps the most
typical structure in France is the corridor-tomb
in which the chamber is indistinguishable from
the passage, and the whole forms a long rect-
angular area. This is the allee couverte in the
narrower sense. In the department of Oise occurs
a special type of this in which one of the end-
slabs has a hole pierced in its centre and is pre-
ceded by a small portico consisting of two uprights
supporting a roof-slab (Fig 10). A remarkable

Fig. io. Alike couverte, called La
Pierre aux Fees, Oise, France. (Compte
rendu du Congres Prihistorique de
France. )

example in Brittany known as Les Pierres Plates
turns at a sharp angle in the middle, and is thus
elbow- shaped.

In the north of France the allte is often merely
cut out in the surface of the ground and has no

61

ROUGH STONE MONUMENTS

roof at all. It is sometimes paved with slabs and
divided into two partitions by an upright with
a hole in its centre. Tombs of this kind often
contain from forty to eighty skeletons, some of
which are in the contracted position. The skulls
are in some cases trepanned, i.e. small round
pieces of the bone have been cut out of them ;
such pieces are sometimes found separate in the
graves. No objects of metal occur in these North
French tombs.

There are many fine examples in Brittany of
the corridor-tomb with distinct chamber. The
best known lies on the island of Gavr'inis (Mor-
bihan). It is covered by a tumulus nearly 200
feet in diameter. The circular chamber, 6 feet in
height, is roofed by a huge block measuring 13
feet by 10. The corridor which leads out to the
edge of the mound is 40 feet in length. Twenty-
two of the upright blocks used in this tomb are
almost entirely covered with engraved designs.
These are massed together with very little order,
the main object having been apparently to cover
the whole surface of the stone with ornament.
The designs consist of spirals, concentric circles
and semicircles, chevrons, rows of strokes, and
triangles, and bear a considerable resemblance to
those of Lough Crew and New Grange in Ireland.

Another tomb in the same district, that of
Mane-er-Hroeck, was intact when discovered in
1863. It contained within its chamber a hoard

62

FRANCE, SPAIN, AND PORTUGAL

. .

of 101 axes of fibrolite and jadeite, 50 pebbles
of a kind of turquoise known as callais, pieces of
pottery, flints, and a peculiarly fine celt of jadeite
together with a flat ring-shaped club-head of the
same stone. The tomb was concealed by a huge
oval mound more than 100 yards in length. The
famous Mont S. Michel is an artificial mound
containing a central megalithic chamber and

Fig. ir. Chambered mound at Fontenay-le-
Marmion, Normandy. (After Montelius, Orient
itnd Etiropa. )

63

ROUGH STONE MONUMENTS

several smaller cists, some of which held cremated
bodies.

A very remarkable mound in Calvados (Fig. n)
was found to contain no less than twelve circular
corbelled chambers, each with a separate entrance
passage. The megalithic tombs of Brittany all
belong to the late neolithic period, and contain
tools and arrow-heads of flint, small ornaments of
gold, calla'is, and pottery which includes among
its forms the bell-shaped cup.

In Central and South France the alUes couvertes
are mostly of a semi-subterranean type, i.e. they
are cut in the ground and merely roofed with
slabs of stone. The most famous is that of the
Grotte des Fees near Aries (Fig. 12), in which a
passage (a) with a staircase at one end and two
niches (b b) in its sides leads into a narrow rect-
angular chamber (c). The total length is nearly
80 feet. Another tomb of the same type, La
Grotte du Castellet, contained over a hundred
skeletons, together with thirty-three flint arrow
or spear-heads, one of which was stuck fast in
a human vertebra, a bell-shaped cup, axes of
polished stone, beads and pendants of various
materials, 114 pieces of calla'is, and a small plaque
of gold.

On the plateau of Ger near the town of Dax are
large numbers of mounds, some of which contain
cremated bodies in urns and others megalithic
tombs. Bertrand saw in this a cemetery of two

64

FRANCE, SPAIN, AND PORTUGAL

^

.«

O ?o

o^

Ph

M

65

ROUGH STONE MONUMENTS

different peoples living side by side. But it has
since been shown that the cremation mounds
belong to a much later period than those which
contain megalithic graves. In these last the
skeletons were found seated around the walls of
the chamber accompanied by objects of flint
and other stone, beads of callais, and small gold
ornaments.

Fig. 13. The so-called dolmen-
deity, from the tombs of the Petit
Morin. (After de Baye.)

France has also its rock-hewn tombs, for in
the valley of the Petit-Morin is a series of such
graves. A trench leads down to the entrance,
which is closed by a slab. The chamber itself is
completely underground. In the shallower tombs
were either two rows of bodies with a passage
between or separate layers parted by slabs or
strata of sand. In the deeper were seldom more
than eight bodies, in the extended or contracted

66

FRANCE, SPAIN, AND PORTUGAL

position, with tools and weapons of flint, pots,
and beads of amber and of callai's. On the walls
were rough sculptures of human figures (Fig. 13),
to which we shall have to return later.

The Channel Islands possess megalithic monu-
ments not unlike those of Brittany. They are
corridor-tombs covered with a mound and often
surrounded by a circle of stones. Within the
chamber, which is usually round, lies, under a
layer of shells, a mass of mingled human and
animal bones. The bodies had been buried in
the sitting position, and with them lay objects
of stone and bone, but none of metal.

The Spanish Peninsula abounds in megalithic
monuments. With the exception of a few menhirs,
whose purpose is uncertain, all are sepulchral.
Dolmens and corridor-tombs are numerous in
many parts, especially in the north-east provinces,
in Galicia, in Andalusia, and, above all, in Portu-
gal. There is a fine dolmen in the Vail Gorguina
in North-East Spain. The cover-slab, measuring
10 feet by 8, is supported by seven rough uprights
with considerable spaces between them. In the
same region is a ruined dolmen surrounded by
a circle nearly 90 feet in circumference, consisting
of seven large stones, some of which appear to
be partly worked. Circles are also found round
dolmens in Andalusia. Portugal abounds in fine
dolmens both of the round and rectangular types.

67

ROUGH STONE MONUMENTS

At Fonte Coberta on the Douro stands a
magnificent dolmen known locally as the Moors'
House. In the name of the field, Fonte Coberta,
there is doubtless an allusion to the belief that the
dolmens conceal springs of water, a belief also
held in parts of Ireland.

At Eguilaz in the Basque provinces is a fine
corridor-tomb, in which a passage 20 feet long,
roofed with flat slabs, leads to a rectangular
chamber 13 feet by 15 with an immense cover-
slab nearly 20 feet in length : the whole was
covered with a mound of earth. The chamber
contained human bones and " lanceheads of stone
and bronze." A famous tomb of a similar type
exists at Marcella in Algarve. The chamber is a
fine circle of upright slabs. It is paved with
stones, and part of its area is divided into two
or perhaps three rectangular compartments. A
couple of orthostatic slabs form a sort of neck
joining the circle to the passage, which narrows
as it leads away from the circle, and was probably
divided into two sections by a doorway whose side-
posts still remain.

In South-East Spain the brothers Siret have
found corridor-tombs in which the chamber is
cut in the rock surface and roofed with slabs ;
the entrance passage becomes a slope or a stair-
case. Here we have a parallel to the Giants'
Graves of Sardinia, which are built usually of
stone blocks on the surface, but occasionally are

68

FRANCE, SPAIN, AND PORTUGAL

cut in the solid rock. Other tombs in the same
district show the common megalithic construction
consisting of a base course of upright slabs sur-
mounted by several courses of horizontal masonry
(Fig. 14). The chamber is usually round, and

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may have two or more niches in its circumference.
It is roofed by the successive overlapping or
corbelling of the upper courses. The vault thus
formed is further supported by a pillar of wood

69

/

ROUGH STONE MONUMENTS

or stone set in the centre of the chamber. On
the walls of some of the chambers there are traces
of rough painting in red. The whole tomb is
covered with a circular mound. In the best known
example at Los Millares there are remains of a
semicircular facade in front of the entrance, as
in many other megalithic monuments.

The finest, however, of all the Spanish monu-
ments is the corridor-tomb of Antequera in Anda-
lusia. It consists of a short passage leading into
a long rectangular chamber roofed with four
slabs. Within it on its axial line are three stone
pillars placed directly under the three meeting-
points of the four slabs, but quite unnecessary
for their support. The whole tomb is covered
with a low mound of earth. In the great upright
slab which forms the inner end of the chamber is
a circular hole rather above the centre.

It is not the plan of this tomb, but the size, that
compels the admiration of the beholder. He
stands, as it were, within a vast cave lighted only
from its narrow end, the, roof far above his head.
The rough surface of the blocks lends colour to
the feeling that this is the work of Nature and
not of man. Here, even if not in Stonehenge, he
will pause to marvel at the patient energy of the
men of old who put together such colossal masses
of stone.

Among the corridor-tombs of Spain must be
mentioned a wedge-shaped type which bears a

70

FRANCE, SPAIN, AND PORTUGAL

close resemblance to those of Munster in Ireland
(cf. Fig. 7). In Alemtejo, south of Cape de Sines,
are several of these, usually about 6 feet in length,
with a slight portico at one end.

A further point of similarity with the Irish
monuments is seen in the corridor-tombs of Monte
Abrahao in Portugal, where the chamber walls
seem to have been reinforced by an outer lining
of slabs. Remains of eighty human bodies were
found in this tomb, together with objects of stone
and bone, including a small conical button similar
to that of Carrowmore in Ireland.

The Spanish Peninsula also possesses rock-
hewn tombs. At Palmella, near Lisbon, is a
circular example about 12 feet in diameter pre-
ceded by a bell-shaped passage which slopes
slightly downwards. Another circular chamber
in the same group has a much longer passage,
which bulges out into two small rounded ante-
chambers. These tombs have been excavated
and yielded some pottery vases, together with
objects of copper and beads of a peculiar precious
stone called callais. All the finds made in the
megalithic remains of Spain and Portugal point
to the period of transition from the age of stone
to that of metal.

The Balearic Islands contain remarkable mega-
lithic monuments. Those known as the talayots
are towers having a circular or rarely a square
base and sloping slightly inwards as they rise.

7i

ROUGH STONE MONUMENTS

The largest is 50 feet in diameter. The stones,
which are rather large and occasionally trimmed,

Fig. 15. Section and plan of the Talayot of Sa
Aquila, Majorca. (After Cartailhac. )

72

FRANCE, SPAIN, AND PORTUGAL

are laid flat, not on edge. A doorway just large
enough to be entered with comfort leads through
the thickness of the wall into a round chamber
roofed by corbelling, with the assistance some-
times of one or more pillars. From analogy with
the naraghi of Sardinia, which they resemble
rather closely, it seems probable that the talayots
are fortified dwellings, perhaps only used in time
of danger (Fig. 15).

Fig. 16. Nau cl'Es Tudons, plan and section.
(After Cartailhac.)

The naus or navetas are so named from their
resemblance to ships. The construction is similar
to that of the talayots. The outer wall has a
considerable batter. The famous Nau d'Es Tudons

73

ROUGH STONE MONUMENTS

is about 36 feet in length. The facade is slightly
concave. A low door (a) gives access through a
narrow slab-roofed passage (b) to a long rect-
angular chamber (c), the method of whose roofing
is uncertain. All the naus are built with their
facades to the south or south-east, with the excep-
tion of that of Benigaus Nou, the inner end of
which is cut in the rock, while the outer part is
built up of blocks as usual. The abnormal orienta-
tion was here clearly determined by the desire to
make use of the face of rock in the construction.
The naus seem to have been tombs, as human
remains have been found in them.

Rock-tombs also occur in the islands. The
most remarkable are those of S. Vincent in
Majorca. One of these has a kind of open ante-
chamber cut in the rock, and is exactly similar
in plan to the Grotte des Fees in France (cf.
Fig. 12).

Prehistoric villages surrounded by great stone
walls can still be traced in the Balearic Isles.
The houses were of two types, built either above
ground or below. The first are square or rect-
angular with rounded corners, the base course
occasionally consisting of orthostatic slabs. The
subterranean dwellings are faced with stone and
roofed with flat slabs supported by columns.
In each village was one building of a different type.
It stood above ground and was semicircular in
plan. In its centre stood a horizontal slab laid

74

FRANCE, SPAIN, AND PORTUGAL

across the top of an upright, forming a T-shaped
structure which helped to support the roof-slabs,
but which may also have had some religious
significance. The stones which composed it were
always carefully worked, and the lower was let
into a socket on the under side of the upper.

75

CHAPTER VI
ITALY AND ITS ISLANDS

ITALY cannot be called a country of mega-
lithic monuments. In the centre and north
they do not occur, the supposed examples men-
tioned by Dennis in his Cities and Cemeteries of
Etruria having been proved non-existent by the
Italian Ministry of Education. It is only in the
extreme south-west that megalithic structures
appear. They are dolmens of ordinary type,
except that in some cases the walls are formed
not of upright slabs, but of stones roughly super-
posed one upon another. On the farm of the
Grassi, near Lecce, are what appear to be two
small dolmens at a distance of only 4 feet apart ;
they are perhaps parts of a single corridor-tomb.
In the neighbourhood of Tarentum there is a
dolmen-tomb approached by a short passage, and
at Bisceglie, near Ruvo, there is an even finer
example, the discovery of which is one of the most
important events which have occurred in Italian
prehistoric archaeology during the last few years.
The tomb is a simple rectangular corridor 36 feet
in length, lying east and west. Only one cover-
slab, that at the west end, remains, and the exact

76

ITALY AND ITS ISLANDS

disposition of the rest of the tomb is uncertain.
In one of the side uprights which supports this
slab is a circular hole, which, however, seems to
be the work of Nature, though its presence may
have led to the choice of the stone. The tomb
was carefully excavated, and the remains of
several skeletons were found, one of which lay
in the contracted position on the right side.
Three of the skulls were observed by an expert
to be dolichocephalic, but their fragile condition
prevented the taking of actual measurements.
Burnt bones of animals, fragments of pottery, a
terra-cotta bead, and a stone pendant were also
found, together with flint knives and a fragment
of obsidian.

These discoveries show that the heel of Italy
fell under the influence which caused the spread
of the megalithic monuments, whatever that
influence mav have been. The same influence

■j

may also have been responsible for the bronze
age rock-hewn tombs of Matera in the Basilicata,
each of which is surrounded by a circle of fairly
large stones.

Geographical considerations would lead one to
suppose that the same conditions existed in
Sicily, and it is possible that this was the case.
Yet it is an affirmation which must be made with
great reserve. Megalithic J monuments in the
ordinary sense of the term are unknown in Sicily.
There are, however, four tombs in the south-east

77

ROUGH STONE MONUMENTS

of the island which show some affinity to mega-
lithic work. Two of these were found by Orsi at
Monteracello. They were rectangular chambers
built of squared slabs of limestone set on edge. At
one end of the finer of the two was a small opening
or window cut in the upright slab. This same
grave contained a skeleton lying on the right side
with the legs slightly contracted. These two
tombs can hardly be described as dolmens ; they
seem to have had no cover-slabs, and the blocks,
which were small, were let into the earth, scarcely
appearing above the surface. Taken by themselves
the Monteracello tombs would hardly prove the
presence of the megalithic civilization in Sicily.
However, in the valley called Cava Lazzaro there
is a rock-hewn tomb where the vertical face of
the rock in which the tomb is cut has been shaped
into a curved facade, a very usual feature of
megalithic architecture. This is ornamented on
each side of the entrance of the tomb with four
pilasters cut in relief in the solid rock, each pair
being connected by a semicircular arch also in
relief. On the pilasters is incised a pattern of
circles and V-shaped signs. A somewhat similar
arrangement of pilasters is seen in two rock-tombs
at Cava Lavinaro in the same district. This work
forcibly recalls the work of the megalithic builders
in the hypogeum of Halsaflieni in Malta (see
Chap. VII), and on the facades of the Giants'
Tombs in Sardinia (see below). It affords, at any

78

ITALY AND ITS ISLANDS

rate, a presumption that in all three islands we
have to deal with the same civilization if not the
same people.

Such a presumption is not weakened by the
fact that in Sicily the usual form of tomb was the
rock-hewn sepulchre, which, as will be seen later,
is very often a concomitant of the megalithic
monument, and in many cases is proved to be
the work of the same people. In the early neo-
lithic period in Sicily, called by Orsi the Sicanian
Period, rock-hewn tombs seem not to have been
used. It is only at the beginning of the metal age
that they begin to appear. In this period, the
so-called First Siculan, the tomb-chamber was
almost always circular or elliptical, entered by
a small door or window in the face of the rock.
The dead were often seated round the wall of the
chamber, evidently engaged in a funerary feast,
as is clear from the great vase set in their midst
with small cups for ladling out the liquid. A
single tomb often contained many bodies, especi-
ally in cases where the banquet arrangement was
not observed ; one chamber held more than a hun-
dred skeletons, and it has been suggested that the
bodies were only laid in the tomb after the flesh
had been removed from the bones, either arti-
ficially or as the result of a temporary burial
elsewhere. Such a custom is not unknown in
other parts of the megalithic area. With these
bodies were found large quantities of painted

79

ROUGH STONE MONUMENTS

pottery, a few implements of copper and many of
flint. Among the ornaments which the dead
carried — for they seem to have been buried in
complete costume — were several axe-shaped pen-
dants of polished stone, precisely similar to those
of Sardinia, Malta, and France. The most im-
portant cemeteries of this period are those of
Castelluccio, Melilli, and Monteracello. Near
this last site was also found a round hut based
on a course of orthostatic slabs of typically
megalithic appearance.

In the full bronze age, called the Second Siculan
Period, burial in rock-tombs still remained the
rule. The tomb-form had developed considerably.
The circular type was still usual, though beside
it a rectangular form was fast coming into favour.
The main chamber often had side-niches, and was
usually preceded by a corridor which sometimes
passed through an antechamber. Occasionally
we find an elaborate open-air court outside the
facade of the tomb, built very much after the
megalithic style. Large vertical surfaces of rock
were carefully sought after for tombs, and the
almost inaccessible cliffs of Pantalica and Cassi-
bile are literally honeycombed with them. Where
such surfaces of rock were unobtainable a vertical
shaft was sunk in the level rock and a chamber
was opened off the bottom of it. The tradition
of the banquet of the dead is still kept up, but the
number of the skeletons in each tomb steadily

80

ITALY AND ITS ISLANDS

decreases. The sitting posture is still frequent,
though occasionally the body lies flat on one side
with the legs slightly contracted. Flint is now
rare, but objects of bronze are plentiful. The
local painted pottery has almost entirely given
place to simpler yet better wares with occasional
Mycenean importations.

It is impossible to decide whether this Sicilian
civilization ought to be included under the term
megalithic. If, as seems probable, the idea of
megalithic building was brought to Europe by
the immigration of a new race it is possible that
a branch of this race entered Sicily. In that case
I should prefer to think that they came not at
the beginning of the First Siculan Period as we
know it, but rather earlier. Certain vases found
with neolithic burials in a cave at Villafrati and
elsewhere in Sicily resemble the pottery usually
found in megalithic tombs ; one of them is in fact
a bell-shaped cup, a form typical of megalithic
pottery. It is thus possible that an immigration
of megalithic people into Sicily took place during
the stone age, definitely later than the period of
the earliest neolithic remains on the island, but
earlier than that of such sites as the Castelluccio
cemetery. This, however, is and will perhaps
remain a mere conjecture, though it is quite
possible that there are in the interior of Sicily
dolmens which have not yet come to the notice
of the archaeologist ; in this connection it is worth
g 81

ROUGH STONE MONUMENTS

while to remember that up to five years ago the
existence of dolmens in both Sardinia and Malta
passed unnoticed.

If the inclusion of Sicily in the megalithic area
is doubtful there is fortunately no question about
the island of Sardinia. Here we have one of the
chief strongholds of the megalithic civilization,
where the architecture displays its greatest
variety and flexibilit}^. The simplest manifesta-
tion of megalithic building, the dolmen, was up
till lately thought to be absent from Sardinia,
but the researches of the last few years have
brought to light several examples, of which the
best known are those of Birori, where the chamber
is approximately circular in plan.

The monuments, however, for which Sardinia
is most famous are the nuraghi. A nuraghe is a
tower-like structure of truncated conical form,
built of large stones laid in comparatively regular
courses (PI. II, Fig. 2). The stones are often
artificially squared, and set with a clay mortar.
The plan and arrangement of a simple nuraghe
are usually as follows (Fig. 17) : The diameter
of the building is generally under 30 feet. A door
of barely comfortable height even for an average
man and surmounted by a single lintel-block
gives access to a narrow passage cut through the
thickness of the wall. In this passage are, to the
right, a small niche (c) just large enough to hold

82

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ITALY AND ITS ISLANDS

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Fig. 17. Elevation, section and plan of a
nuraghe. (Pinza, Momnnenti Antichi.)

83

ROUGH STONE MONUMENTS

a man, and, on the left, a winding staircase in
the wall (d) leading to an upper storey. The
passage itself leads into the chamber (a), which is
circular, often with two or three side-niches (b b),
and roofed by corbelling, i.e. by making each of
the upper courses of stones in its wall project
inwards over the last. The upper chamber,
which is rarely preserved, is similar in form to the
lower.

Considerable speculation has been indulged
in concerning the purpose of the nuraghi. For
many years they were regarded as tombs, a view
which was first combated by Nissardi at the
International Congress in Rome in 1903. Further
exploration since that time has placed it beyond
all doubt that the nuraghi were fortified dwellings.
The form of the building itself is almost conclusive.
The lowness of the door would at once put an
enemy at a disadvantage in attempting to enter ;
it is significant that in the nuraghe of Su Cadalanu,
where the doorway was over 6 feet in height, its
breadth was so much reduced that it was necessary
to enter sideways. Arrangements were made
for the closing of the entrance from inside by a
heavy slab of stone, often fitted into grooves.
The niche on the right of the passage clearly
served to hold a man, who would command the
passage itself and the staircase to the upper floor ;
he would, moreover, be able to attack the un-
defended flank of an enemy entering with his

S4

ITALY AND ITS ISLANDS

shield on his left arm. To the same effort at
impregnability we may safely ascribe the fact
that the staircase leading to the upper room did
not begin on the floor-level of the passage, but
was reached through a hole high up in the wall.
Many of the nuraghi are surrounded by elaborate
fortifications consisting of walls, towers, and
bastions, sometimes built at the same time as the
dwelling itself, sometimes added later. Those of
Aiga, Losa, and s'Aspru are among the most
famous of this type. All the nuraghi stand in
commanding situations overlooking large tracts
of country, and the more important a position is
from the strategical point of view the stronger
will be the nuraghe which defends it. All are
situated close to streams and springs of good
water, and some, as for instance that of Abbameiga,
are actually built over a natural spring. At
Nossiu is a building which can only be described
as a fortress. It consists of a rhomboidal en-
closure with nuraghe-like towers at its corners
and four narrow gateways in its walls. It is
surrounded by the ruins of a village of stone huts.
There cannot be the least doubt that in time of
danger the inhabitants drove their cattle into the
fortified enclosure, entered it themselves, and
then closed the gates.

Each nuraghe formed the centre of a group of
stone huts. Mackenzie has described such a
village at Serucci, where the circular plan of the

85

ROUGH STONE MONUMENTS

huts was still visible. The walls in one case stood
high enough to show, from the corbelling of their
upper courses, that the huts were roofed in the
same fashion as the nuraghi themselves. Another
village, that which surrounds the nuraghe of Su
Chiai, was protected by a wall of huge stones.

It is thus clear that the nuraghi were the
fortified centres of the various villages of Sardinia.
Probably each formed the residence of the local
chieftain ; that they were actually inhabited is
clear from the remains of everyday life found in
them, and from the polish which continual use
has set on the side -walls of some of the staircases.
In general appearance and design the nuraghi
recall the modern truddhi, hundreds of which dot
the surface of Apulia and help to beguile the
tedium of the railway journey from Brindisi to
Foggia. The truddhi, however, are built in steps
or terraces and have no upper chamber.

Who were the foes against whom such elaborate
preparations for defence were made ? Two
alternatives are possible. Either Sardinia was a
continual prey to some piratical Mediterranean
people, or she was divided against herself through
the rivalry of the local chieftains.

The second explanation is perhaps the more
probable. Mackenzie seems to adopt it, and fancies
that in the growth of the largest nuraghi we may
trace the rise to power of some of these local
dynasts at the expense of their neighbours. He

86

ITALY AND ITS ISLANDS

suggests that the existence of the fortified en-
closure of Nossiu, where there is no sign of a true
nuraghe, may mean that there were certain
communities which succeeded in maintaining
their independence in the face of these powerful
rulers. But here, as he himself is the first to
admit, we are in the realm of pure conjecture.

Fig. 18. Giant's Tomb at Muraguada, Sar-
dinia. (Mackenzie, Papers of the British School
of J\owe, V. )

It is now established that in the Giants' Tombs
of Sardinia we are to see the graves of the inhabi-
tants of the nuraghe villages. Every Giant's
Tomb lies close to such a village, and almost every
village has its Giants' Tombs, one or more in
number according to its size. A Giant's Tomb
consists of a long rectangular chamber of upright
slabs roofed by corbelled masonry (Fig. 18).

87

ROUGH STONE MONUMENTS

The slab which closes one end of the tomb is of
great size, and consists of a lower rectangular
half with a small hole at the base and an upper
part shaped like a rounded gable. There is a
raised border to the whole slab, and a similar
band in relief marks out the two halves. This
front slab forms the centre-piece in a curved
facade of upright slabs. The chamber is covered
with a coating of ashlar masonry, which is shaped
into an apsidal form at the end opposite to the
facade. Occasionally more than 50 feet in length,
the Giants' Tombs served as graves for whole
families, or even for whole villages. Mackenzie
has shown that the form is derived from the
simple dolmen, and has pointed out several of
the intermediate stages.

The inhabitants of Sardinia in the megalithic
period also buried their dead in rock-hewn sepul-
chres, of which there are numerous examples at
Anghelu Ruju. The contents of these graves
make it clear that they are the work of the same
people as the Giants' Graves. Were further proof
needed it could be afforded by a grave at Molafa,
where a Giant's Grave with its facade and gabled
slab has been faithfully imitated in the solid rock.
There is a similar tomb at St. George. Two
natural caves in Cape Sant* Elia on the south of
the island contain burials of this same period.

The neighbouring island of Corsica also contains

SS

ITALY AND ITS ISLANDS

important megalithic remains. They consist of
thirteen dolmens, forty-one menhirs, two aligne-
ments, and a cromlech. They fall geographically
into two groups, one in the extreme north and the
other in the extreme south of the island.

The stones used are chiefly granite and gneiss.
The dolmens, which are of carefully chosen flat
blocks showing no trace of work, are all rectangular
in plan, and usually consist of four side-walls and
a cover-slab. The finest of all, however, the dol-
men of Fontanaccia, has seven blocks supporting
the cover, one at each short end, three in one of the
long sides, and two in the other. None of the
dolmens are covered by mounds.

Of the alignements, that of Caouria seems to
consist, in part at least, of two parallel lines of
menhirs, the rest of the plan being uncertain.
There are still thirty-two blocks, of which six
have fallen. The other alignement, that of Rinaiou,
consists of seven menhirs set in a straight line.
The cromlech is circular and stands on Cape Corse.

On the small island of Pianosa, near Elba, are
several rock-hewn tombs of the aeneolithic period
which ought perhaps to be classed with the
megalithic monuments of Sardinia and Corsica.

89

CHAPTER VII

AFRICA, MALTA, AND THE SMALLER
MEDITERRANEAN ISLANDS

NORTH AFRICA is a great stronghold of the
megalithic civilization, indeed it is thought
by some that it is the area in which megalithic
building originated. Morocco, Tunis, Algeria, and
Tripoli all abound in dolmens and other monu-
ments. Even in the Nile Valley they occur, for
what looks like a dolmen surrounded by a circle
was discovered by de Morgan in the desert near
Edfu, and Wilson and Felkin describe a number
of simple dolmens which exist near Lado in the
Sudan. Tripoli remains as yet comparatively
unexplored. The traveller Barth speaks of stone
circles near Mourzouk and near the town of
Tripoli. The great trilithons {senams) with holes
pierced in their uprights and ' altar tables ' at
their base, which Barth, followed by Cooper in
his Hill of the Graces, described as megalithic
monuments, have been shown to be nothing
more than olive-presses, the ' altar tables ' being
the slabs over which the oil ran off as it descended.
True dolmens do, however, occur in Tripoli, and
Cooper figures a fine monument at Messa in the

90

AFRICA, MALTA, ETC.

Cyrenaica, which appears to consist of a single
straight line of tall uprights with a continuous
entablature of blocks similar to that of the outer
circle at Stonehenge.

Algeria has been far more completely explored,
and possesses a remarkable number of megalithic
monuments. Many of the finest are situated near
the town of Constantine. Thus at Bou Nouara
there is a hill about a mile in length which is a
regular necropolis of dolmen-tombs. Each grave
consists of a dolmen within a circle of stones.
The blocks are all natural and completely un-
worked. The circle consists of a wall of stone
blocks so built as to neutralize the slope of the
hill and to form a level platform for the dolmen.
Thus on the lower side there are three courses of
carefully laid stones rising to about five feet,
while on the upper side there is only one course.
The diameter of the circles varies from 22 to 33
feet. In the centre of the circle lies the dolmen
with its single long cover-slab. This usually
rests on two entire side-slabs, the ends being filled
up either with entire slabs or with masonry of
small stones. In rare cases the side-slabs are
replaced by masonry walls. The average size of
the cover- slab is 6| by 5 feet. The dolmen itself
is, of course, built directly on to the platform,
and the space between it and the circle is filled
up with rough stones. The orientation of the
dolmens varied considerably, but the cover-slab

91

ROUGH STONE MONUMENTS

was never placed in such a way that its length ran
up the hill-slope, probably because in moving the
slab into place this would have been an awkward
position.

Another equally fine site is that of Bou Merzoug,
near Oulad Rahmoun, about an hour's railway
journey from Constantine. The place is naturally
adapted for a settlement as there is a spring of
water there. This spring was later utilized by the
Romans to provide water for the city of Cirta.
The dolmen-graves lie in great numbers on the
hill at the foot of which the spring rises, and
extend down into the valley. Each dolmen lies
in the centre of a stone circle. This last is in
some cases formed by very large slabs set on edge,
but more often by two or three courses of rough
oblong blocks. Many of the graves are badly
damaged. One of the finest had an outer circle
about 27 feet in diameter, and an inner circle
14 feet in diameter. Between these two a third
circle, much more irregular and of small stones,
could just be distinguished. But in most cases
it was impossible to make out clearly more than
the one outer circle and the dolmen within it.
The dolmen itself consisted of a large slab resting
on walls formed of several large blocks, the spaces
between which were filled up with smaller stones.
None of the stones used were worked. The dol-
mens were not oriented according to any fixed
system. M. Feraud states that the separate

92

AFRICA, MALTA, ETC.

graves were united together by open corridors
formed by double or triple rows of large stones,
but no traces of such a system could be found by
the later visitors to the site, Messrs. Maclver and
Wilkin.

Fortunately we have some record of what
these graves contained, for thirteen were opened
by Mr. Christy and M. Feraud. One contained a
human skeleton in good condition, buried in the
contracted position with the knees to chin and
arms crossed. With this were two whole vases,
fragments of others, and pieces of cedar wood.
At the feet of the skeleton were two human heads,
and as the graves would not have accommodated
more than one whole body M. Feraud suggests
that these belong to decapitated victims. Another
grave contained, in addition to human bones,
those of a horse, together with three objects of
copper, viz. a ring, an earring, and a buckle. In
another were found the teeth and bones of a
horse and an iron bit.

An entirely different type of monument is
found near Msila, south-west of Algiers. Here
is a long low hill called the Senam, covered with
large numbers of stone circles. These consist of
large slabs of natural limestone set up on edge
and not very closely fitted. The height of the
slabs varies from 2 to 3 feet, and the diameters
of the three still perfect circles are 23J, 26}, and
34 J feet respectively. At a point roughly south-

93

ROUGH STONE MONUMENTS

east there is a break in the circumference, filled
by a rectangular niche (Fig. 19) consisting of
three large slabs, and varying in width from 2 ft.
6 in. to 6 feet. There is a possibility that the
niches were originally roofed, but the evidence
on this point is far from conclusive. The interior

o r\9 o0 \>-

Fig 19. Stone circle at the Senam, Algeria.
(After Maclver and Wilkin).

of the circle is filled with blocks of stone, appa-
rently heaped up without any definite plan.
There seems to be no clue as to the meaning of
these circles, as none have as yet been explored.
Maclver and Wilkin are probably right in classing
them as graves.

The most famous, however, of the Algerian
sites is unquestionably that of Roknia. Here the
tombs lie on the side of a steep hill. They consist

94

AFRICA, MALTA, ETC.

of dolmens often surrounded by stone circles
from 25 to 33 feet in diameter. The cover-slabs
of the dolmens usually rest on single uprights,
and never on built walls. Several of the graves
excavated contained more than one body, one
yielding as many as seven. It is remarkable that
three of the skulls showed wounds, the dead having
been apparently killed in battle. Several vases
have been found and a few pieces of bronze.

We have seen that in some of the tombs of Bou
Merzoug objects of iron were found. This makes
it clear that some at least of the Algerian tombs
belong to the iron age, i.e. that they are probably
later than 1000 B.C., but beyond this we cannot go.
The medal of Faustina sometimes quoted as
evidence for a very late date proves nothing, as
it is not stated to have been found in a tomb.
There is no evidence to show how far back the
graves go. It may be that, as Maclver and Wilkin
suggest, the parts of the cemeteries excavated
chance to be the latest. At Bou Merzoug the
excavators worked chiefly among the graves on
the plain and at the bottom of the hill. The more
closely crowded graves which lie on the hill itself
may well be older than these. In fact, all that
may be said of the Algerian graves is that some
are of the iron age, while others may be and
probably are earlier.

In Tunis the dolmen is not uncommon, and

95

ROUGH STONE MONUMENTS

several groups or cemeteries have been reported.
Near Ellez occurs a type of corridor-tomb in which
three dolmen-like chambers lie on either side of a
central passage, and a seventh at the end opposite
to the entrance. The whole is constructed of
upright slabs of stone, and is surrounded by a
circle formed in the same way.

Morocco, too, has its dolmens, especially in the
district of Kabylia, while near Tangier there is a
stone circle.

Off the north coast of Africa, and thus on the
highway which leads from Africa to Europe, lie
the Italian islands of Lampedusa and Linosa. The
latter is volcanic in origin, and its surface presents
no opportunity for the building of megalithic monu-
ments. Lampedusa, on the other hand, consists
of limestone, which lies about in great blocks on
its surface. On the slopes of the south coast there
are several remains of megalithic construction,
but they are too damaged to show much of their
original form. However, on the north side of the
island there are megalithic huts in a very fair
state of preservation. They are oval in form and
have in many cases a base course of orthostatic
slabs.

Some miles to the north of Linosa lies the much
larger volcanic island of Pantelleria, also a posses-
sion of Italy. Here megalithic remains both of

96

AFRICA, MALTA, ETC.

dwellings and of tombs have been found. On the
plateau of the Mursia are the remains of rect-
huts made of rough blocks of stone.

angular

These huts seemed to have formed a village,
which was surrounded by a wall for purposes of
defence. In the huts were found implements of
obsidian and flat stones used for grinding.

The tombs of the people who inhabited this
village are, unlike the houses, circular or elliptical

Fig. 20. Plan of the Sese Grande, Pantelleria.
(Orsi, Momimenti Antichi, IX.)

in form. They are locally known as sesi. The
smaller are of truncated conical shape, the circular
chamber being entered by a low door and having
a corbelled roof. In one of the sesi a skeleton was
found buried in the contracted position. The
h 97

ROUGH STONE MONUMENTS

finest of the tombs, known as the Sese Grande,
elliptical in form (Fig. 20), has a major diameter
of more than 60 feet, and rises in ridges, being
domed at the top. It contains not one chamber,
but twelve, each of which has a separate entrance
from the outside of the sese. To judge by the
remains found in the sesi they belong entirely to
the neolithic period.

The island of Malta as seen to-day is an almost
treeless, though not unfertile, stretch of rock,
with a harbour on the north coast which must
always make the place a necessary possession to
the first sea power of Europe. Much of its soil
is of comparatively modern creation, and four
thousand years ago the island may well have had a
forbidding aspect. This is perhaps the reason
why the first great inroads of neolithic man into
the Mediterranean left it quite untouched, al-
though it lay directly in the path of tribes immi-
grating into Europe from Africa. The earliest
neolithic remains of Italy, Crete, and the ^Egean
seem to have no parallel in Malta, and the first
inhabitants of whom we find traces in the island
were builders of megalithic monuments. Small
as Malta is it contains some of the grandest and
most important structures of this kind ever erected.
The two greatest of these, the so-called " Phoeni-
cian temples " of Hagiar Kim and Mnaidra, were
constructed on opposite sides of one of the southern

98

AFRICA, MALTA, ETC.

99

ROUGH STONE MONUMENTS

valleys, each within sight of the other and of the
little rocky island of Filfla.

The temple of Mnaidra is the simpler of the
two in plan (Fig. 21). It consists of two halves,
the more northerly of which was almost certainly
built later than the other. Each half consists of
two elliptical chambers set one behind the other.
The south half is the better preserved. It has a
concave facade of large orthostatic slabs with
horizontal blocks set in front of them to keep
them in position. In the centre of this opens a
short paved passage formed of fine upright slabs
of stone, one of which is 13 feet in height. The
first elliptical chamber (E) into which this passage
leads us has a length of 45 feet. Its walls (PI. Ill)
consist of roughly squared orthostatic slabs over
6 feet in height, above which are several courses
of horizontal blocks which carry the walls in
places up to a height of nearly 14 feet. This
combination of vertical and horizontal masonry
is typical of all the Maltese temples. To the left
of the entrance is a rectangular niche in the wall
containing one of the remarkable trilithons (a)
which form so striking a feature of Mnaidra and
Hagiar Kim. It consists of a horizontal slab of
stone nearly 10 feet in length, supported at its
ends by two vertical slabs about 5 feet high. To
the right of the entrance is a window-like opening
(b, behind the seated figure in PI. Ill) in one of
the slabs of the wall, preceded by two steps and

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AFRICA, MALTA-, fiTC.

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giving access to an irregular triangular space (F).
In the north-west angle of this triangle is fixed
a trilithon table (c) of the usual type, 32 inches
high ; at a like height above the table is fixed
another horizontal slab which serves as a roof to
the corner. The south corner of the triangle is
shut off by a vertical slab, in which is cut a window
29 inches by 17. Through this is seen a shrine (?)
consisting of a box (d) made of five well-cut slabs
of stone, the front being open. The aperture by
which F is entered was evidently intended to be
closed with a slab of stone from the inside of F,
for it was rebated on that side, and there are holes
to be used in securing the slab. When the entrance
was thus blocked F still communicated with E
by means of a small rectangular window 16 inches
by 12 in one of the adjacent slabs (visible in
PL III).

Returning to the area E we find in the south-
west wall an elaborate doorway (PI. II, Fig. 1,
p. 82) leading to a rectangular room H. The
doorway consists of two tall pillars with a great
lintel laid across the top. The space between
the pillars is closed by a fixed vertical slab in
which is a window-like aperture similar to that
which gives access to Room F. All the stones
in this doorway are ornamented with pit-marks.
The rectangular room H has niches in its walls
to the north, south,, and west. Each niche is
formed by a pair of uprights with a block laid

101

ROUGH STONE MONUMENTS

across the top. The west niche is occupied by a
horizontal table or slab (e) supported at its centre
by a stone pillar 39 inches in height, of circular
section narrowing in the centre (visible through
the doorway in PL II, Fig. 1). The southern
niche contains an ordinary trilithon table (/) :
the northern niche is damaged, but apparently
held a table like that of the western.

The area / consists of only half an ellipse, the
southern half being replaced by the area H, which
we have already described. It has a rectangular
niche to the west containing a fine trilithon with
a cover-slab nearly 10 feet long.

The whole of the southern half of the Mnaidra
temple is surrounded by a wall of huge rough
blocks of stone, presenting a great contrast to
the dressed slabs of which the inner walls are
formed. They are placed alternately with their
broad faces and their narrow edges outwards.
The roughness of this enclosure wall gives the
structure a remarkably wild and craggy appearance
from a distance. The northern half of Mnaidra
is clearly a later addition.

There is no doubt as to the way in which the
areas were roofed. In the apse-like ends of the
elliptical rooms the horizontal courses are cor-
belled, i.e. each course projects slightly forward
over the last. Thus the space narrows as the
walls rise, until the aperture is small enough to
be roofed by great slabs laid across. The cor-

102

AFRICA, MALTA, ETC.

belling of the apse is just perceptible in PI. III.
Whether the roofing of the Mnaidra temple was
ever complete it is impossible to say : in any case
the system we have described could only be applied
to the apsidal portions of the areas, and their
centres must either have been open to the sky
or roofed quite simply with slabs.

In the still more famous temple, of Hagiar Kim
we have a complicated building, in which the
original plan has been much altered and enlarged.
The main portion doubtless consisted originally
of a curved facade and a pair of elliptical areas,
the inner of which has been fitted with a second
entrance to the north-west and completely re-
modelled at its south-west end. Four elliptical
chambers, one of which is at a much higher level
than the rest of the building, have been added.
Here, too, as at Mnaidra, we find niches containing
trilithon tables. In the first elliptical area, in which
the apsidal ends are divided from the central space
by means of walls of vertical slabs, a remarkable
group of objects was found. In front of a well-cut
vertical block stood what must be an altar, cut
in one piece of stone. It is square in section
except for the top, which is circular. On the four
vertical edges are pilasters in relief, and in the
front between these is cut in relief what looks
like a plant growing out of a pot or box. To the
left of the altar and the vertical slab behind were

103

ROUGH STONE MONUMENTS

an upright stone with two hanging spirals cut on
it in relief, and at its foot a horizontal slab. Both
the altar and the carved stone are covered with
small pit-marks.

In the outside wall of the building, quite un-
connected with the interior, is a niche partly
restored on old foundations, in which stands a
rough stone pillar 6\ feet high. In front of this
pillar is a vertical slab nearly 3 feet high, narrowing
towards the base, and covered with pit-markings.
This pillar can hardly be anything but a baetyl,
or sacred stone.

The temple called the Gigantia, on the island
of Gozo, is no less remarkable than the two which
we have already described ; in one place its wall
is preserved up to a height of over 20 feet. The
plan is similar to that of Mnaidra, though here
the two halves seem to have been built at one and
the same time. Several of the blocks show a
design of spirals in relief, while on others there are
the usual pit-markings. Another bears a figure
of a fish or serpent. At the foot of one of the
trilithons was found a baetyl 51 inches in height,
now in the museum at Valletta.

That these three buildings were sanctuaries of
some kind seems almost certain from their form
and arrangement. We do not, however, know
what was the exact nature of the worship carried
on in them, though there can be no doubt that
the stone tables supported by single pillars and

104

AFRICA, MALTA, ETC.

the trilithons found in the niches played an
important part in the ritual. Sir Arthur Evans
in his famous article Mycencean Tree and Pillar
Cult has suggested that in Malta we have a cult
similar to that seen in the Mycenaean world.
This latter was an aneiconic worship developed
out of the cult of the dead ; in it the deity or hero
was represented by a baetyl, i.e. a tree or pillar
sometimes standing free, sometimes placed in a
1 dolmen-like ' cell or shrine, in which latter case
the pillar often served to support the roof of the
shrine. In Malta Sir Arthur Evans sees signs of
a baetyl-worship very similar to this. Thus at
Hagiar Kim we have a pillar still standing free
in a niche, and another pillar, which, to judge
from its shape, must have stood free, was found
in the Gigantia. On the other hand, at Mnaidra
we have pillars which support slabs in a cell or
shrine, and at Cordin several small pillars were
found which must originally have served a similar
purpose.

There can hardly be any doubt that Sir Arthur
Evans is right in seeing in the Maltese temples
signs of a baetylic worship. But is he right in his
further assertion that the cult was a cult of the
dead ? Albert Mayr assumes that he is, and
endeavours to show that the ' dolmen-like ' cells
in the niches are not altars, but stereotyped
representations of the dolmen-tombs of the
heroes worshipped. He thinks that the slabs

i°5

ROUGH STONE MONUMENTS

which cover them are too large for altar-tables,
and that the niches in which- they stand are too
narrow and inaccessible to have been the scene
of sacrificial rites. Neither of these arguments
has much force, nor is it easy to see how the cells
are derived from dolmens. The fact is that the
word ' dolmen-like,' which has become current
coin in archaeological phraseology, is a question-
begging epithet. The Maltese cells are not like
dolmens at all, they are either trilithons or tables
resting on a pillar. They are always open to the
front, and instead of the rough unhewn block
which should cover a dolmen they are roofed with
a well-squared slab. If the pillar which supports
the slab is, like the free-standing pillars, a baetyl,
the slab is probably a mere roof to cover and
protect it ; if not, the slab is almost certainly a
table.

At the same time, although we may not accept
the hypothesis that the cell is derived from a
dolmen, Sir Arthur Evans may still be right in
supposing the worship to have originated in a
cult of the dead. But he was almost certainly
wrong, as recent excavation has shown, in sup-
posing that the cells were the actual burial place
of the deified heroes.

A number of statuettes were found at Hagiar
Kim, two of which are of pottery and the rest of
limestone. One figure represents a woman
standing, but in the rest she is seated on a rather

1 06

AFRICA, MALTA, ETC.

low stool with her feet tucked under her. There
is no sign of clothing, except on one figure which
shows a long shirt and a plain bodice with very
low neck. All these statuettes are characterized
by what is known as steatopygy, that is, the over-
development of the fat which lies on and behind
the hips and thighs.

Steatopygous figures have been found in many
places, viz. France, Malta, Crete, the Cyclades,
Greece, Thessaly, Servia, Transylvania, Poland,
Egypt, and the Italian colony of Eritrea on the
Red Sea. The French examples are from caves
of the palaeolithic period ; the rest mainly belong
to the neolithic and bronze ages. Various reasons
have been given for the abnormal appearance of
these figures. In the first place it has been sug-
gested that they represent women of a steatopygous
type, like the modern Bushwomen, and that this
race was in early days widely diffused in the
Mediterranean and in South Europe. Another
hypothesis is that they represent not a truly
steatopygous type of women, but only an ab-
normally fat type. A third suggestion is that they
portray the generative aspect of nature in the
form of a pregnant goddess.

Naturallv there are considerable local differences
in the shapes of the figures from the various
countries we have enumerated, and it may
be that no single hypothesis will explain them
all.

107

ROUGH STONE MONUMENTS

There are other megalithic buildings in Malta
besides the three which we have discussed, but
none of them call for more than passing mention.
On the heights of Cordin or Corradino, overlooking
the Grand Harbour of Valletta, there are no less
than three groups, all of which have been lately
excavated. In all three we see signs of the typical
arrangement of elliptical areas one behind another,
and in the finest of the three the curved facade
and the paved court which lies before it are still
preserved.

It was for a long time believed that there were
no dolmens in Malta. Professor Tagliaferro has
been able to upset this belief by discovering two,
one near Musta and the other near Siggewi. It
is hardly credible that these are the only two
dolmens which ever existed in Malta. More will
no doubt yet be found, especially in the wild
north-west corner of the isle.

The megalithic builders of Malta did not confine
their achievements to structures above ground,
they could also work with equal facility below.
In the village of Casal Paula, which lies about a
mile from the head of the Grand Harbour of
Valletta, is a wonderful complex of subterranean
chambers known as the Hypogeum of Halsaflieni,
which may justly be considered as one of the
wonders of the world.

The chambers, which seem to follow no definite

108

AFRICA, MALTA, ETC.

plan, are excavated in the soft limestone and
arranged in two storeys connected by a staircase,
part of which still remains in place. The finest
rooms are in the upper storey. The largest is
circular, and contains in its walls a series of false
doors and windows. It is in this room that the
remarkable nature of the work in the hypogeum is
most apparent. On entering it one sees at once
that the intention of the original excavator was
to produce in solid rock underground a copy of a
megalithic structure above ground. Thus the
walls curve slightly inwards towards the top as
do those of the apses of Mnaidra and Hagiar Kim,
and the ceiling is cut to represent a roof of great
blocks laid across from wall to wall with a space
left open in the centre where the width would be
too great for the length of the stones. The treat-
ment of the doors and windows recalls at once that
of the temples above ground. The mason was
not content, when he needed a door, to cut a
rectangular opening in the rock ; he must repre-
sent in high relief the monolithic side-posts and
lintel which were the great features of the mega-
lithic ' temples ' of Malta. Nor has he failed in
his intention, for, as one moves from room to
room in the hypogeum, one certainly has the
feeling of being in a building constructed of
separate blocks and not merely cut in the solid
rock. No description can do justice to the grace
of the curves and the flow of the line in the circular

109

ROUGH STONE MONUMENTS

chamber and in the passage beyond it, and we
have here the work of an architect who felt the
aesthetic effect of every line he traced.

Behind the circular chamber and across the
passage just referred to lies a small room which,
rightly or wrongly, has been called the ' Holy of
Holies,' the idea being that it formed a kind of
inner sanctuary to the chamber. It contains a
rough shelf cut in the wall, and in the centre of
this a shallow circular pit. It has been suggested
that this pit was made to hold the base of the
cult-object, whether it was a baetyl or an idol.
This, however, is a mere conjecture. In the
passage just outside the door of this room are
two small circular pits about 6 inches in diameter
and the same distance apart. They connect with
one another below, and are closed with tightly
fitting limestone plugs. In one of them was found
a cow's horn. Their purpose is unknown, but
similar pairs of pits occur elsewhere at Halsaflieni.

In two of the largest chambers in the hypogeum
the roof and walls are still decorated with designs
in red paint. The patterns consist of graceful
combinations of curved lines and spirals. Many
other rooms, including the circular chamber,
were originally painted with designs in red, which
have now almost wholly disappeared.

Many of the chambers are extremely small,
too small for an adult even to stand upright
in them, and their entrances are merely win-

1 10

AFRICA, MALTA, ETC.

dows, perhaps a foot square and well above the
ground.

What then was the purpose of this wonderful
complex of rooms ? Before attempting to answer
this question we must consider what has been
found in them. When the museum authorities
first took over the hypogeum practically all the
chambers were filled to within a short distance of
their roofs with a mass of reddish soil, which proved
to contain the remains of thousands of human
skeletons. In other words, Halsaflieni was used as
a burial place, though this may not have been its
original purpose. The bones lay for the most part
in disorder, and so thickly that in a space of about
4 cubic yards lay the remains of no less than 120
individuals. One skeleton, however, was found
intact, lying on the right side in the crouched
position, i.e. with arms and knees bent up.

With the bones were found enormous quantities
of pottery and other objects, buried with the dead
as provision for the next world. The pottery is
rough in comparison with the fine painted wares
of Crete, but it is extremely varied in its decora-
tion. One particularly fine bowl shows a series
of animals which have been identified by Pro-
fessor Tagliaferro as the long-horned buffalo, an
animal which once existed on the northern coasts
of Africa. Ornaments of all kinds were common,
and include beads, pendants, and conical buttons
of stone and shell. The most remarkable of all

in

ROUGH STONE MONUMENTS

are a large number of model celts made of jadeite
and other hard stones. These are of the same
shape as the stone axes used by neolithic man,
but they are far too small ever to have been used,
and they must therefore have been models hung
round the neck as amulets. Each is provided
with a small hole for this purpose. The popularity
of the axe-amulet makes it probable that the axe
had some religious significance.

Finally Halsaflieni has yielded several steatopy-
gous figurines. Some of these resemble those of
Hagiar Kim, but two are of rather different type.
Each of these represents a female lying on a rather
low couch. In the better preserved of the two
she lies on her right side, her head on a small
uncomfortable-looking pillow. The upper part
of her body is naked, but from the waist down-
wards she is clad in a flounced skirt which reaches
to the ankles. The other figurine is very similar,
but the woman here is face downwards on the
couch.

The bodies themselves were so damaged with
damp that only ten skulls could be saved whole.
These, however, afford very valuable anthro-
pological evidence. They have been carefully
measured by Dr. Zammit, and they prove to
belong to a long-headed (dolichocephalic) type
usual among the neolithic races of the Mediter-
ranean.

We have still to discuss the purpose of this

112

AFRICA, MALTA, ETC.

great complex of underground chambers and
passages. It is quite clear that its eventual fate
was to be used as a burial place for thousands of
individuals, but it is far from certain that this
was the purpose for which it was built. The
existence of the central chamber, with its careful
work and laborious imitation of an open-air
' temple,' is against this interpretation. It has
therefore been suggested that the hypogeum was
meant for a burial place, and that the central
chamber was the chapel or sanctuary in which
the funeral rites were performed, after which the
body was buried in one of the smaller rooms.
This, however, does not explain the presence of
burials in the chapel itself, and it is far more likely
that it was only after Halsaflieni had ceased to be
used for its original purpose that it was seized
upon as a convenient place for burial.

The question of the date of the Maltese mega-
lithic buildings is a difficult one. It is true that
no metal has been found in them, and that we
can therefore speak of them as belonging to the
neolithic age. But the neolithic age of Malta need
not be parallel in date with that of Crete for
example. It is extremely probable that Malta
lay outside the main currents of civilization, and
that flint continued to be used there long after
copper had been adopted by her more fortunate
neighbours.

"3

CHAPTER VIII
THE DOLMENS OF ASIA

IN the south-east of Europe lie three groups
of dolmens which are no doubt in origin
more closelv connected with those of Asia than
with those of the rest of Europe. The first group
lies in Bulgaria, where no less than sixty dolmens
have been found north of Adrianople. The
second consists of a few dolmens which still
remain in the Crimea, and the third lies in the
Caucasus in two divisions, one to the south-east
and the other to the south-west of the town of
Ekaterinodar. These last are made of slabby
rock, and thus have a finished appearance. A
dolmen near Tzarskaya has a small semicircular
hole at the bottom of one of its end-slabs, while
another in the valley of Pehada has sides con-
sisting of single blocks, placed so as to slant in-
wards considerably, and a circular hole in the
centre of the slab which closes one of its ends.

In Asia megalithic monuments are not infre-
quent. We first find them in Syria, they have
been reported from Persia, and in Central and
South India they exist in large numbers. Corridor-
tombs occur in Japan, but they are late in date,

114

THE DOLMENS OF ASIA

and there is no evidence to show whether they are
connected with those of India or not.

Syria is comparatively rich in megalithic
monuments, but it is remarkable that almost all
of them lie to the east of the Jordan. Thus while
there are hundreds of dolmens in the country of
Pera and in Ammon and Moab, very few have been
found in Galilee, and only one in Judaea, despite
careful search. There is, however, a circle of

Fig. 22. Dolmen with holed stone at Ala Safat.
(After de Luynes. )

stones west of Tiberias, and an enclosure of
menhirs between Tyre and Sidon. According to
Perrot and Chipiez some of the Moabite monu-
ments are very similar in type to the Giants'
Tombs of Sardinia. Others are simple dolmens.

115

ROUGH STONE MONUMENTS

In a good example at Ala Safat (Fig. 22) the floor
of the tomb is formed by a single flat slab of
stone. The great cover-slab rests on two long
blocks, one on either side, placed on edge. The
narrow ends are closed up with smaller slabs,
one of which, that which faces north, has a small
hole pierced in it. A similar closure slab with a
hole is also found in certain rock-tombs quite
close to this dolmen. Apparently none of these
dolmens have been systematically excavated, and
nothing is known of their date.

Menhirs, too, are not wanting in Syria. Perrot
and Chipiez figure an example from Gebel-Mousa
in Moab which is quite unworked, except for a
shallow furrow across the centre of the face. In
many cases the menhir is surrounded by one or
more rows of stones. Thus at Der Ghuzaleh a
menhir about 3 feet in height is set in the centre
of what when complete must have been a rect-
angle. In other cases the enclosure was elliptical
or circular in form. In an example at Minieh the
menhir stands in the centre of a double (in part
triple) circle of stones, on which abuts an elliptical
enclosure. In some cases the circle has no proper
entrance, in others it has a door consisting of a
large slab resting on two others. The largest of
the circles attains a diameter of 600 feet, and has
a double line of stones.

Within these circles and near them are found
large numbers of monuments consisting each of a

116

THE DOLMENS OF ASIA

large flat slab resting on two others. On the upper
surface of the top slab are often seen a number of
basin-shaped holes, sometimes connected by fur-
rows. Many of the slabs are slightly slanting,
and it has been suggested that the series of holes
and furrows was intended for the pouring a
libation of some kind. In a monument of this
type at Amman the cover-slab slopes considerably ;
the upper part of its surface is a network of small
channels converging on a hole n inches deep
about the centre of the slab. Here, again, no
excavations have been carried out, and we do
not even know what was the purpose of these
structures. It is, however, probable that these
trilithons were not, like the dolmens, tombs, but
served some religious purpose, possibly connected
with the worship of the menhirs.

In the Jaulan, where the rock consists of a
slabby type of basalt, there are many dolmens
of fine appearance. They often lie east and west,
and are often broader at the west end. Many are
surrounded by a double circle of stones. In one
of them two copper rings were found. At Ain
Dakkar more than 160 dolmen-tombs are visible
from a single spot. They are built on circular
terraces of earth and stones about 3 feet high.
The Arabs call them Graves of the Children of
Israel. Most of them lie east and west, and are
broader at the west. In the eastern slab there is
often a hole about 2 feet in diameter. Near Tsil

117

ROUGH STONE MONUMENTS

are several corridor-tombs of simple type. Each
consists of a long rectangular chamber with only
one cover-slab, that being at the west end. In
a well-known example of this type at Kosseir
there is a hole in one of the two uprights which
support the cover.

These examples will serve to show the import-
ance and variety of the Syrian monuments. They
present analogies with those of many parts of the
megalithic area, and we therefore await anxiously
the publication of Mackenzie's promised article on
his own explorations in this district.

The central and southern parts of India afford
numerous examples of dolmens. They are to be
found in almost all parts of Lower India from the
Nerbudda River to Cape Comorin. In the Nilgiri
hills there are stone circles and dolmens, and
numbers of dolmens are said to exist in the
Neermul jungle in Central India. In the collec-
torate of Bellary dolmens and other monuments
to the number of 2129 have been recorded.
Others occur in the principality of Sorapoor and
near Vellore in the Madras presidency. These
latter appear to be of two types, either with three
supports only or with four supports, one of which
is pierced with a circular hole. Of the 2200
dolmens known in the Deccan half are of this
pierced type. They are known to the natives
as " dwarfs' houses." One only had a pair of

118

THE DOLMENS OF ASIA

uprights outside the pierced stone, thus forming
a sort of portico to the dolmen. Near Chittore in
North Arcot there is said to be a square mile of
ground covered with these monuments. In them
were found human remains in sarcophagi, and
fragments of black pottery. Several of the Indian
dolmens are said to have contained objects of
iron. Occasionally the dolmen is surrounded by
a double circle of stones or covered with a cairn.
The Deccan, in addition to its numerous dolmens,
possesses also megalithic monuments of another
type. They consist each of two rows, each of
thirteen unworked stones set as close together as
possible, in front of which is a row of three stones,
each about 4 feet high, not let into the ground.
The planted stones were whitewashed, and each
was marked with a large spot of red paint with
black in the centre. These stones seem to have
been in use in modern times. Colonel Forbes
Leslie thinks that a cock had been sacrificed on
one of the three stones which lie in front of the
double row, but there seems to be no certain
evidence for this. It is, however, very probable
that these alignements had some religious signi-
fication, and the same is no doubt true of certain
small circles of small stones, also found in the
Deccan.

The modern inhabitants of the Khasi Hills in
India still make use of megalithic monuments.
They set up a group of an odd number of menhirs,

119

ROUGH STONE MONUMENTS

3> 5> 7> 9> or T1, and in front of these two structures
of dolmen form. These are raised in honour of
some important member of the tribe who has
died, and whose spirit is thought to have done
some good to the tribe. If the benefits continue
it is usual to increase the number of menhirs.

The earliest burials in Japan are marked by
simple mounds of earth. It was not until the
beginning of the iron age that megalithic tombs
came into use. The true dolmen is not found in
Japan, and all the known graves are corridor-
tombs covered with a mound. They are of four
types. First, we have a simple corridor with no
separate chamber ; secondly, a corridor broaden-
ing out at one side near the end ; thirdly, a true
chamber with a corridor of access ; and fourthly, a
type in which the corridor is preceded by an ante-
chamber. All four types occur in rough unworked
stone, roofed with huge slabs, but a few examples
of the third type are made of well-cut and dressed
blocks. The mounds are usually conical, though
some are of a complex form shortly to be described.
Some of these contain stone sarcophagi. The
bodies were never cremated, but the bones are so
damaged that it is impossible to say what the
most usual position was. Objects of bronze and
iron together with pottery and ornaments were
found in the tombs.

The more important tombs are of a more

120

THE DOLMENS OF ASIA

complicated type. They seem to have contained
the remains of emperors and their families. They
consist each of a circular mound, to which is added
on one side another mound of trapezoidal form.
The megalithic tomb-chamber or the sarcophagus
which sometimes replaces it lies in the circular
part of the mound. The total axial length of the
basis of the whole mound is in a typical case —
that of Nara (Yamato)— 674 feet, the diameter of
the round end being 420 feet. The mounds have
in most cases terraced sides, and are surrounded
by a moat. In early times it seems to have
been the custom to slay or bury alive the ser-
vants of the emperor on his mound, but this was
given up about the beginning of the Christian
era.

These imperial double mounds seem to begin
about two centuries before the Christian era, and
to continue for five or six centuries after it. Many
of them can be definitely assigned to their owners,
and others are attributed by tradition. Thus a
rather small mound at the foot of Mount Unebi
(Yamato) is considered to be the burial place of
the Emperor Jimmu, the founder of the Imperial
dynasty, and annual ceremonies are performed
before it.

The Japanese Emperors are still buried in
terraced mounds, and in the group of huge stone
blocks which have been placed on the mound of
the Emperor Komei, who died in 1S66, we may be

121

ROUGH STONE MONUMENTS

tempted to see a survival of the ancient megalithic
chamber.

These early corridor-tombs are evidently not
the work of the Ainu, the aborigines of Japan,
but of the Japanese invaders who conquered
them. These latter do not seem to have brought
the idea of megalithic building with them, as
their earlier tombs are simple mounds. As no
dolmen has yet been found in Japan we cannot at
present derive the corridor- tomb there from it.
It is, however, worthy of mention that true dol-
mens occur as near as Corea, though none have
been reported from China.

122

CHAPTER IX

THE BUILDERS OF THE MEGALITHIC MONU-
MENTS, THEIR HABITS, CUSTOMS,
RELIGION, ETC.

WITH regard to the date of the megalithic
monuments it only remains to sum up
the evidence given in the previous chapters. It
may be said that in Europe they never belong to
the beginning of the neolithic age, but either to
its end or to the period which followed it, i.e. to
the age of copper and bronze. The majority date
from the dawn of this latter period, though some
of the chambered cairns of Ireland seem to belong
to the iron age. Outside Europe there are cer-
tainly megalithic tombs which are late. In North
Africa, for example, we know that the erection
of dolmens continued into the early iron age ;
many of the Indian tombs are clearly late, and
the corridor-tombs of Japan can be safely attri-
buted in part at least to the Christian era.

With what purpose were the megalithic monu-
ments erected ? The most simple example, the
menhir or upright stone, may have served many
purposes. In discussing the temples of Malta

123

ROUGH STONE MONUMENTS

we saw reason for believing that the megalithic
peoples were in the habit of worshipping great
stones as such. Other stones, not actually wor-
shipped, may mark the scene of some great event.
Jacob commemorated a dream by setting up the
stone which had served him as a pillow, and
Samuel, victorious over the Philistines, set up
twelve stones, and called the place " Stones of
Deliverance." Others again perhaps stood in
a spot devoted to some particular national or
religious ceremony. Thus the Angami of the
present day in Assam set up stones in com-
memoration of their village feasts. It seems clear
from the excavations that the menhirs do not
mark the place of burials, though they may in
some cases have been raised in honour of the
dead.

The question of the purpose of stone circles
has already been dealt with in connection with
those of Great Britain. Alignements are more
difficult to explain, for, from their form, they
cannot have served as temples in the sense of
meeting-places for worship. Yet they must
surely have been connected with religion in some
way or other. Possibly they were not constructed
once and for all, but the stones were added gradu-
ally, each marking some event or the performance
of some periodic ceremony, or even the death of
some great chief. The so-called " Canaanite High
Place " recently found at Gezer consists of a line

124

THE BUILDERS

of ten menhirs running north and south, together
with a large block in which was a socket for an
idol or other object of worship. Several bodies
of children found near it have suggested that the
monument was a place of sacrifice.

Other megalithic structures can be definitely
classed as dwellings or tombs, as we have seen
in our separate treatment of them. It is not
improbable that, if we are right in considering
the dolmen as the most primitive form of mega-
lithic monument, megalithic architecture was
funerary in origin. Yet, as we find it in its great
diffusion, it provides homes for the living as well
as for the dead. In their original home, perhaps in
Africa, the megalithic race may have lived in huts
of wattle or skins, but after their migration the
need of protection in a hostile country and the
exigencies of a colder climate may have forced
them to employ stone for their dwellings. In any
case, in megalithic architecture as seen in Europe
the tomb and the dwelling types are considerably
intermixed, and may have reacted on one another.
This, however, does not justify the assertion so
often made that the megalithic tomb was a
conscious imitation of the hut. It is true that
some peoples make the home of their dead to
resemble that of the living. Among certain
tribes of Greenland it is usual to leave the dead
man seated in his hut by way of burial. But such
a conception does not exist among all peoples,

125

ROUGH STONE MONUMENTS

and to say that the dolmen is an imitation in
stone of a hut is the purest conjecture. Still
more improbable is Montelius's idea that the
corridor-tomb imitates a dwelling. It is true
that the Eskimos have a type of hut which is
entered by a low passage often 30 feet in length,
but for one who believes as Montelius does that
the corridor-tomb is southern or eastern in origin
such a derivation is impossible, for this t}^pe of
house is essentially northern, its aim being to
exclude the icy winds. In the south it would be
intolerably close, and its low passage besides
serving no purpose would be inconvenient.

There is really no reason to derive either the
dolmen or the corridor-tomb from dwellings at
all. Granted the use of huge stones, both are
purely natural forms, and the presence of the
corridor in the latter is dictated by necessity.
The problem was how to cover a large tomb-
chamber with a mound and to leave it still acces-
sible for later interments, and the obvious solution
was to add a covered passage leading out to the
edge of the mound.

A remarkable feature of the megalithic tombs
is the occurrence in many of them of a small round
or rectangular hole in one of the walls, usually an
end-wall, more rarely a partition-wall between
two chambers. Occasionally the hole was formed
by placing side by side two upright blocks each

126

THE BUILDERS

with a semicircular notch in its edge. Tombs
with a holed block or blocks occur in England,
instances being the barrows of Avening and
Rodmarton, King Orry's Grave in the Isle of Man,
Lanyon Quoit in Cornwall, and Plas Newydd in
Wales, which has two holes. There are also
examples in Ireland, France, Belgium, Cen-
tral Germany, and Scandinavia, where they are
common. Passing further afield we find holes
in the Giants' Graves of Sardinia, and in Syria,
the Caucasus, and India, where half the dolmens
in the Deccan are of this type. The holes are
usually too small to allow of the passage of a
human body. It has been suggested that they
served as an outlet for the soul of the deceased,
or in some cases as a means of passing in food to
him.

Attention has been frequently drawn to curious
round pits so often found on the stones of dolmens
and usually known as cup-markings. They vary
in diameter from about two to four inches, and
are occasionally connected by a series of narrow-
grooves in the stone. They vary considerably in
number, sometimes there are few, sometimes
many. They occur nearly always on the upper
surface of the cover-slab, very rarely on its under
surface or on the side -walls.

Some have attempted to show that these pits
are purely natural and not artificial. It has been
suggested, for instance, that they are simply the

127

ROUGH STONE MONUMENTS

casts of a species of fossil sea-urchin which has
weathered out from the surface of the stone. This
explanation ma}' b.e true in some cases, but it
will not serve in all, for the ' cups ' are sometimes
arranged in such regular order that their artificial
origin is palpable. These markings are found on
dolmens and corridor-tombs in Palestine, North
Africa, Corsica, France, Germany, Scandinavia,
and Great Britain. In Wales there is a fine ex-
ample of a dolmen with pits at Clynnog Fawr,
while in Cornwall we may instance the monument
called " The Three Brothers of Gragith " near
Meneage .

There is no clue to the purpose of these pits.
Some have thought that they were made to hold
the blood of sacrifice which was poured over the
slab, and from some such idea may have arisen
some of the legends of human victims which still
cling round the dolmens. Others have opposed
to this the fact that the pits sometimes occur on
vertical walls or under the cover-slabs, and have
preferred to see in them some totemistic significa-
tion or some expression of star-worship. It is
possible that we have to deal with a complex and
not a simple phenomenon, and that the pits were
not all made to serve a single purpose. Those
which cover some of the finest stones at Mnaidra
and Hagiar Kim are certainly meant to be orna-
mental, though there may be in them a reminiscence
oi some religious tradition. In any case, it is

128

THE BUILDERS

worth while to remember that cup-markings also
occur on natural rocks and boulders in Switzerland,
Scandinavia, Great Britain (where there is a good
example near Ilkley in Yorkshire), near Como in
Italy, and in Germany, Russia, and India.

Of the builders of the megalithic monuments
themselves we cannot expect to know very much,
especially while their origin remains veiled in
obscurity. Yet there are a few facts which stand
out clearly. We even know something about their
appearance, for the skulls found in the megalithic
tombs have in many cases been subjected to
careful examination and measurement. Into
the detail of these measurements we cannot enter
here ; suffice it to say that the most important of
them are the maximum length of the skull from
front to back and its maximum breadth, both
measures, of course, being taken in a straight
line with a pair of callipers, and not round the
contour of the skull. If we now divide the maxi-
mum breadth by the maximum length and multiply
the result by ioo we get what is known as the
cephalic index of the skull. Thus if a skull has
a length of 180 millimetres and a breadth of 135,
its cephalic index is iff X 100, i.e. 75. It is clear
that in a roundish type of head the breadth will
be greater in proportion to the length than in a
narrow elliptical type. Thus in a broad head the
cephalic index is high, while in a narrow head it

k 129

ROUGH STONE MONUMENTS

is low. The former is called brachycephalic
(short-headed), and the latter dolichocephalic
(long-headed).

This index is now accepted by most anthropolo-
gists as a useful criterion of race, though, of course,
there are other characteristics which must often
be taken into account, such as the height and
breadth of the face, the cubic capacity of the
skull and its general contour. At any rate, if we
can show that the skulls of the megalithic tombs
conform to a single type in respect of their index
we shall have a presumption, though not a cer-
tainty, that they belong to a single race.

For Africa the evidence consists in a group of
twenty skulls from dolmen-tombs giving cephalic
indices which range from 70*5 to 84*4. The
average index is 75*27, and the majority of the
indices lay within a few units of that number.
Ten skulls from Halsaflieni in Malta have cephalic
indices running from 66 to 75*1, the average being
71 '84. Of a series of 44 skulls from the rock-
tombs of the Petit Morin in France, 12 had an
index of over 80, 22 were between 75 and 80, and
10 were below 75. But in the dolmens of Lozere
distinctly broad skulls were frequent. A series
of British neolithic skulls, mostly from barrows,
ran from 67 to 77.

The builders of the megalithic monuments
thus belonged in the main to a fairly dolicho-
cephalic race or races, for the large majority of

130

THE BUILDERS

the skulls measured are of a long-headed type.
There are, however, in various localities, especially
in France, occasional anomalous types of skull
which are distinctly brachycephalic, and show
that contamination of some kind was taking or
had taken place.

Of the state of civilization to which the builders
of the megalithic monuments had attained, and
of the social condition in which they lived, there
is something to be gathered. It is clear in the
first place from the evidence of the Maltese
buildings that they were a pastoral people who
domesticated the ox, the sheep, the pig, and the
goat, upon whose flesh they partly lived. Shell-
fish also formed a part of their diet, and the shells
when emptied of their contents were occasionally
pierced to be used as pendants or to form neck-
laces or bracelets.

Whether these people were agricultural is a
question more difficult to answer. It is true that
flat stones have been found, on which some kind
of cereal was ground up with the aid of round
pebbles, but the grain for which these primitive
mills were used may have been wild and not
cultivated. No grain of any kind has been found
in the Maltese settlements.

The megalithic race do not seem to have been
great traders. This is remarkably exemplified in
Malta, where there is not a trace of connection

131

ROUGH STONE MONUMENTS

with the wonderful civilization which must have
been flourishing so near at hand in Crete and the
Mgean at the time when the megalithic temples
were built. The island seems to have been en-
tirely self-sufficing, except for the importation of
obsidian, probably from the neighbouring island
of Linosa. Of copper, which wide trade would
have introduced, there is no sign.

Some writers, however, have argued the exist-
ence of extensive trade-relations from the occur-
rence of a peculiar kind of turquoise called callai's
in some of the megalithic monuments of France
and Portugal. The rarity of this stone has inclined
some archaeologists to attribute it to a single
source, while some have gone so far as to consider
it eastern in origin. For the last theory there is no
evidence whatsoever. No natural deposit of
callai's is known, but it is highly probable that the
sources of the megalithic examples lay in France
or Portugal.

It would of course be foolish to suppose that
the megalithic people received none of the pro-
ducts of other countries, especially at a time when
the discovery of copper was giving a great impetus
to trade. No doubt they enjoyed the benefits of
that kind of slow filtering trade which a primitive
tribe, even if it had wished, could hardly have
avoided, but they were not a great trading nation
as were the Cretans of the Middle and Late
Minoan Periods, or the Egyptians of the Xllth

132

THE BUILDERS

and XVIIIth Dynasties. We know nothing of
their political conditions, of the groups into which
they were divided, or the centres from which they
were governed. That there were strong centres
of government is, however, clear from the very
existence of such huge monuments, many of which
must have required the combined and organized
labour of large armies of workers, in the gathering
of which the state was doubtless strongly backed
by religion.

We have seen that the megalithic peoples
frequently dwelt in huts of great stones. Yet in
the majority of cases their huts must have been,
like those of most primitive races, of perishable
material, such as wood, wattle, skins, turf, and
clay. As for their form there was probably a
continual conflict between the round and the
rectangular plan, just as there was in the stone
examples. Which form prevailed in any particu-
lar district was probably determined almost by
accident. Thus in Sardinia the round type was
mostly kept for the huts and nuraghi, while the
rectangular was reserved for the dolmens and
Giants' Graves. Even here the confusion between
the two types is shown by the fact that near
Birori there are two dolmens with a round plan.
Again, in Pantelleria the huts of the Mursia are
rectangular, while the sesi, which are tombs, are
roughly circular. It is therefore probable that
the round and rectangular types of building were

133

ROUGH STONE MONUMENTS

both in use among the megalithic people before
they spread over Europe.

Within their huts these people led a life of the
simplest description. Their weapons and tools,
though occasionally of copper, were for the most
part of stone. Flint was the most usual material.
In Scandinavia it was often polished, but else-
where it was merely flaked. The implements
made from it were of simple types, knives, borers,
scrapers, lanceheads, and more rarely arrowheads.
Many of these were quite roughly made, no more
flaking being done than was absolutely necessary
to produce the essential form, and the work being,
when possible, confined to one face of the flint.

In the Mediterranean obsidian, a volcanic rock,
occasionally took the place of flint, especially in
Sardinia and Pantelleria. Axes or celts were often
made of flint in Scandinavia and North Germany,
but elsewhere other stones, such as jade, jadeite,
and diorite were commonly used.

We can only guess at the way in which the
megalithic people were clothed. No doubt the
skins of the animals they domesticated and of
those they hunted provided them with some form
of covering, at any rate in countries where it was
needed. Possibly they spun wool or flax into a
thread, for at Halsaflieni two objects were found
which look like spindle-whorls, and others occur
on sites which are almost certainly to be attributed
to the megalithic people. There is, however,

134

THE BUILDERS

nothing to show that they wove the thread into
stuffs.

The love of personal decoration was highly
developed among them, and all branches of nature
were called upon to minister to their desire for
ornament. Shells, pierced and strung separately
or in masses, were perhaps their favourite adorn-
ment, but close on these follow beads and pendants
of almost every conceivable substance, bone, horn,
stone, clay, nuts, beans, copper, and occasionally
gold.

One small object assumes a great importance
on account of its wide distribution. This is the
conical button with two converging holes in its
base to pass the thread through. This little object,
which may have served exactly the purpose of
the modern button, occurs in several parts of the
megalithic area. There are examples in Malta
made of stone and shell. Elsewhere it is most
usually of bone. It occurs in Sardinia, in France,
in the rock- tombs of Gard, and in the corridor and
rock-tombs of Lozere and Ardeche, in Portugal
in the allee couverte of Monte Abrahao, in Bohuslan
(Sweden), and at Carrowmore in Ireland. Outside
the megalithic area it has been found in two of the
Swiss lake-dwellings and in Italy.

The pottery of the megalithic people was of a
simple type. It was all made by hand, the potter's
wheel being still unknown to the makers. Pottery
with painted designs does not occur outside Sicily,

i3S

ROUGH STONE MONUMENTS

except for a few poor and late examples in Malta.
The best vases were of fairly purified clay, moder-
ately well fired, and having a polished surface,
usually of a darkish colour. On this surface were
often incised ornamental designs, varying both
in type and in the skill with which they were
engraved. As a rule the schemes were rectilinear,
more rarely they were carried out in curves.
Sardinia furnishes some fine examples of rectilinear
work, while the best of the curved designs are
found in Malta, where elaborate conventional
and even naturalistic patterns are traced out with
wonderful freedom and steadiness of hand.

The pottery of the megalithic area is not all alike;
it would be surprising if it were. Even supposing
that the invaders brought with them a single
definite style of pottery-making this would
rapidly become modified by local conditions and
by the already existing pottery industry of the
country, often, no doubt, superior to that of the
new-comers. Nevertheless, there are a few points
of similarity between the pottery of various parts
of the megalithic area. The most remarkable
example is the bell-shaped cup, which occurs in
Denmark, England, France, Spain, Sardinia, and
possibly Malta (the specimen is too broken for
certainty). Outside the area it is found in Bohemia,
Hungary, and North Italy. Here, as in the case
of the conical button, we cannot argue that the
form was actually introduced by the megalithic

136

THE BUILDERS

race, though there is a certain possibility in favour
of such a hypothesis.

That the megalithic people possessed a religion
of some kind will hardly be doubted. Their
careful observance of the rites due to the dead,
and their construction of buildings which can
hardly have been anything but places of worship,
is a strong testimony to this. We have seen that
in the Maltese temples the worship of baetyls or
pillars of stone seems to have been carried on.
Several stone objects which can scarcely have
been anything but baetyls were found in the
megalithic structures of Los Millares in Spain,
but none are known elsewhere in the megalithic
area.

There is some reason for thinking that among
the megalithic race there existed a cult of the axe.
In France, for instance, the sculptured rock-
tombs of the valley of the Petit Morin show, some
a human figure, some an axe, and some a com-
bination of the two. This same juxtaposition of
the two also occurs on a slab which closed the
top of a corbelled chamber at Collorgues in Gard.
A simple allee couverte at Gohlitzsch in Saxony
has on one of its blocks an axe and handle engraved
and coloured red. There are further examples
in the allee couverte of Gavr'inis and the
dolmen called La Table des Marchands at Loc-
mariaquer.

137

ROUGH STONE MONUMENTS

These sculptured axes call to mind at once the
numerous axe-shaped pendants of fine polished
stone (jade, jadeite, etc.) found in Malta, Sicily,
Sardinia, and France, and apparently used as
amulets. The excavation of Crete has brought
to light a remarkable worship of the double axe,
and it has been argued with great probability
that one of the early boat signs figured on the pre-
dynastic painted vases of Egypt is a double axe,
and that this was a cult object. It seems very
probable that in the megalithic area, or at least
in part of it, there was a somewhat similar worship,
the object of cult, however, being not a double
but a single axe, usually represented as fitted with
a handle. It need not be assumed that the axe
itself was worshipped, though this is not im-
possible ; it is more likely that it was an attribute
of some god or goddess.

Among the rock-hewn tombs of the valley of
the Petit Morin in the department of Marne,
France, were seven which contained engravings
on one of the walls. Several of these represent
human figures (Fig. 13). The eyes are not marked,
but the hair and nose are clear. In some the breasts
are shown, in others they are omitted. On each
figure is represented what appears to be a collar
or necklace. Similar figures occur on the slabs
of some of the allees converter of Seine et Oise, and
on certain blocks found in and near megalithic
burials in the South of France. Moreover, in the

138

THE BUILDERS

departments of Aveyron, Tarn, and Herault have
been found what are known as menhir-statues,
upright pillars of stone roughly shaped into human
semblance at the top ; they are of two types, the
one clearly female and the other with no breasts,
but always with a collar or baldric.

It has been argued that these figures repre-
sent a deity or deities of the megalithic people.
Dechelette, comparing what are apparently tattoo
marks on a menhir-statue at Saint Sermin (Avey-
ron) with similar marks on a figure cut on a
schist plaque at Idanha a Nova (Portugal) and
on a marble idol from the island of Seriphos in the
/Egean, seems inclined to argue that in France
and Portugal we have the same deity as in the
^Egean. This seems rather a hazardous con-
jecture, for we know that many primitive peoples
practised tattooing, and, moreover, it is not
certain that the French figures represent deities
at all. It is quite as likely, if not more so, that
they represent the deceased, and take the place
of a grave-stone : this would account for the
occurrence of both male and female types. This
was almost certainly the purpose of six stones
that remain of a line that ran parallel to a now
destroyed tomb at Tamuli (Sardinia). Three have
breasts as if to distinguish the sex of three of those
buried in the tomb. We must not therefore
assume that any of the French figures represents
a ' dolmen-deity/

i39

ROUGH STONE MONUMENTS

The method of burial observed in the megalithic
tombs is almost universally inhumation. Crema-
tion seems to occur only in France, but there it is
beyond all doubt. The known examples are found
in the departments of Finistere, Marne, and
Aisne, and in the neighbourhood of Paris. In Finis-
tere out of 92 megalithic burials examined 61
were cremations, 26 were inhumations, and 5
were uncertain. It is extremely curious that this
small portion of France should be the only part
of the megalithic area where cremation was prac-
tised. It is generally held that cremation was
brought into Europe by the broad-headed ' Alpine '
people, who seem to have invaded the centre of
the continent at some period in the neolithic age.
It is possible that in parts of France a mixture
took place between the megalithic builders and
the Alpine race. Intermarriage would no doubt
lead to confusion in manv cases between the two
rites.

In all other cases the builders of the megalithic
monuments buried their dead unburned. Often
the bod}' was lying stretched out on its back, or
was set in a sitting position against the side of the
tomb ; but most frequently it was placed in what
is known as the contracted position, laid on one
side, generally the left, with the knees bent and
drawn up towards the chin, the arms bent at the
elbow, and the hands placed close to the face.
Many explanations of this position have been

140

THE BUILDERS

suggested. Some see in it a natural posture of
repose, some an attempt to crowd the body into
as small a space as possible. Some have suggested
that the corpse was tightly bound up with cords
in order that the spirit might not escape and do
harm to the living. Perhaps the most widely
approved theory is that which considers this
position to be embryonic, i.e. the position of the
embryo previous to birth. None of these explana-
tions is entirely convincing, but no better one has
been put forward up to the present.

This custom, it must be noted, was not limited
to the megalithic peoples. It was the invariable
practice of the pre-dynastic Egyptians and has
been found further east in Persia. It occurs in the
neolithic period in Crete and the iEgean, in Italy,
Switzerland, Germany, and other parts of Europe,
and it is one of the facts which go to show that the
builders of the megaliths were ethnologically con-
nected, however remotely, with their predecessors
in Europe.

At Halsaflieni, in Malta, we have perhaps ex-
amples of the curious custom of secondary inter-
ment ; the body is buried temporarily in some
suitable place, and after the flesh has left the bones
the latter are collected and thrown together into
a common ossuary. That the bones at Halsaflieni
were placed there when free from flesh is probable
from the closeness with which they were packed
together (see p. in ). There are also possible ex-

141

ROUGH STONE MONUMENTS

amples in Sicily (see p. 79). The custom was not
unknown in neolithic days, especially in Crete. It
is still occasionally practised on the island and on
the Greek mainland, where, after the dead have
lain a few years in hallowed soil, their bones are
dug up, roughly cleaned, and deposited in caves.

142

CHAPTER X

WHO WERE THE BUILDERS, AND WHENCE
DID THEY COME?

MODERN discussion of the origin of the
megalithic monuments may be said to
date from Bertrand's publication of the French
examples in 1864. In this work Bertrand upheld
the thesis that " the dolmens and allees couvertes
are sepulchres ; and their origin seems up to the
present to be northern." In 1865 appeared Bon-
stetten's famous Essai sur les dolmens, in which he
maintained that the dolmens were constructed by
one and the same people spreading over Europe
from north to south. At this time the dolmens of
North Africa were still unstudied. In 1867 followed
an important paper by Bertrand. In 1872 two
events of importance to the subject occurred, the
publication of Fergusson's Rude Stone Monuments
in All Countries, and the discussion raised at the
Brussels Congress by General Faidherbe's paper
on the dolmens of Algeria. Faidherbe maintained
the thesis that dolmens, whether in Europe or
Africa, were the work of a single people moving
southward from the Baltic Sea.

The question thus raised has been keenly de-

143

ROUGH STONE MONUMENTS

bated since. At the Stockholm Congress in 1874
de Mortillet advanced the theory that megalithic
monuments in different districts were due to
different peoples, and that what spread was the
custom of building such structures and not the
builders themselves. This theory has been ac-
cepted by most archaeologists, including Montelius,
Salomon Reinach, Sophus Miiller, Hoernes, and
Dechelette. But while the rest believe the influ-
ences which produced the megalithic monuments
to have spread from east to west, i.e. from Asia to
Europe, Salomon Reinach holds the contrary view,
which he has supported in a remarkable paper
called Le Mirage Oriental, published in 1893.

The questions we have to discuss are, therefore,
as follows : Are all the megalithic monuments
due to a single race or to several ? If to a single
race, whence did that race come and in what
direction did it move ? If to several, did the idea
of building megalithic structures arise among the
several races independently, or did it spread from
one to another ?

We shall consider first the theory that the idea
of megalithic building was evolved among several
races independently, i.e. that it was a phase of
culture through which they separately passed.

On the whole, this idea has not found favour
among archaeologists. The use of stone for build-
ing might have arisen in many places indepen-
dently. But megalithic architecture is something

144

WHO WERE THE BUILDERS?

much more than this. It is the use of great stones
in certain definite and particular ways. We have
already examined what may be called the style of
megalithic architecture and found that the same
features are noticeable in all countries where these
buildings occur. In each case we see a type of
construction based on the use of large orthostatic
slabs, sometimes surmounted by courses of hori-
zontal masonry, with either a roof of horizontal
slabs or a corbelled vault. Associated with this
we frequently find the hewing of underground
chambers in the rock. In almost all countries
where megalithic structures occur certain fixed
types prevail ; the dolmen is the most general of
these, and it is clear that many of the other forms
are simply developments of this. The occurrence
of structures with a hole in one of the walls and
of blocks with ' cup-markings ' is usual over the
whole of the megalithic area. There are even more
remarkable resemblances in detail between struc-
tures in widely separated countries. Thus the
Giants' Tombs of Sardinia all have a concave
facade which forms a kind of semicircular court
in front of the entrance to the tomb. This feature
is seen also in the temples of Malta, in the tomb
of Los Millares in Spain, in the naus of the Balearic
Isles (where, however, the curve is slight), in
the Giant's Grave of Annaclochmullin and the
chambered cairn of Newbliss in Ireland, in the
tomb of Cashtal-yn-Ard in the Isle of Man, in the

ROUGH STONE MONUMENTS

barrow of West Tump in Gloucestershire, and in
the horned cairns of the north of Scotland. These
parallels are due to something more than co-
incidence ; in fact, it is clear that megalithic
building is a widespread and homogeneous system,
which, despite local differences, always preserves
certain common features pointing to a single
origin. It is thus difficult to accept the suggestion
that it is merely a phase through which many races
have passed. The phases which occur in many
races alike are always those which are natural
and necessary in the development of a people,
such as the phase of using copper. But there is
nothing either natural or necessary in the use of
huge unwieldy blocks of stone where much smaller
ones would have sufficed.

There are further objections to this theory in
the distribution of the megalithic buildings both
in space and time. In space they occupy a very
remarkable position along a vast sea-board which
includes the Mediterranean coast of Africa and
the Atlantic coast of Europe. In other words,
they lie entirely along a natural sea route. It is
more than accident that the many places in
which, according to this theory, the megalithic
phase independently arose all lie in most natural
sea connection with each other, while not one is
in the interior of Europe.

In time the vast majority of the megalithic
monuments of Europe seem to begin near the

146

WHO WERE THE BUILDERS?

end of the neolithic period and cover the copper
age, the later forms continuing occasionally into
that of bronze. Here again it is curious that
megalithic building, if merely an independent
phase in many countries, should arise in so many
at about the same time, and with no apparent
reason. Had it been the use of worked stones that
arose, and had this followed the appearance of
copper tools, the advocates of this theory would
have had a stronger case, but there seems to be
no reason why huge unworked stones should
simultaneously begin to be employed for tombs
in many different countries unless this use spread
from a single source.

For these reasons it is impossible to consider
megalithic building as a mere phase through
which many nations passed, and it must therefore
have been a system originating with one race,
and spreading far and wide, owing either to trade
influence or migration. But can we determine
which ?

Great movements of races by sea were not by
any means unusual in primitive days, in fact, the
sea has always been less of an obstacle to early
man than the land with its deserts, mountains,
and unfordable rivers. There is nothing inherently
impossible or even improbable in the suggestion
that a great immigration brought the megalithic
monuments from Sweden to India or vice versa.
History is full of instances of such migrations.

147

ROUGH STONE MONUMENTS

According to the most widely accepted modern
theory the whole or at least the greater part of
the neolithic population of Europe moved in from
some part of Africa at the opening of the neolithic
age. In medieval history we have the example
of the Arabs, who in their movement covered a
considerable portion of the very megalithic area
which we are discussing.

On the other hand, many find it preferable to
suppose that over this same distance there ex-
tended a vast trade route or a series of trade
routes, along which travelled the influences which
account for the presence of precisely similar
dolmens in Denmark, Spain, and the Caucasus.
Yet although much has been written about
neolithic trade routes little has been proved, and
the fact that early man occasionally crossed large
tracts of land and sea in the great movements
of migration does not show that he also did so by
way of trade, nor does it prove the existence of
such steady and extensive commercial relations
as such a theory of the megalithic monuments
would seem to require. Immigration is often
forced on a race. Change of climate or the divert-
ing of the course of a great river may make their
country unfit for habitation, or they may be
expelled by a stronger race. In either case they
must migrate, and we know from history that
they often covered long distances in their attempt
to follow the line of least resistance. Thus there

148

WHO WERE THE BUILDERS?

is nothing a priori improbable in the idea that the
megalithic monuments were built by a single
invading race.

There are other considerations which support
such a theory. It will be readily admitted that
the commonest and most widely distributed form
of the megalithic monument is the dolmen. Both
this and its obvious derivatives, the Giant's Grave,
the allee couverte, and others, are known to have
been tombs, while other types of structure, such
as the Maltese temple, the menhir, and the crom-
lech, almost certainly had a religious purpose.
It is difficult to believe that these types of building,
so closely connected with religion and burial, were
introduced into all these regions simply by the
influence of trade relations. Religious customs
and the burial rites connected with them are
perhaps the most precious possession of a primitive
people, and they are those in which they most
oppose and resent change of any kind, even when
it only involves detail and not principle. Thus
it is almost incredible that the people, for instance,
of Spain, because they were told by traders that
the people of North Africa buried in dolmens,
gave up, even in isolated instances, their habit
of interment in trench graves in favour of burial
in dolmens. It is still more impossible to believe
that this unnatural event happened in one country
after another. It is true that the use of metal
was spread by means of commerce, but here there

149

ROUGH STONE MONUMENTS

was something to be gained by adopting the new
discovery, and there was no sacrifice of religious
custom or principle. An exchange of products
between one country and another is not unnatural,
but a traffic in burial customs is unthinkable.

Perhaps, however, it was not the form of the
dolmen which was brought by commerce, but
simply the art of architecture in general, and this
was adapted to burial purposes. To this there are
serious objections. In the first place it does not
explain why exactly the same types of building
(e.g. the dolmen), showing so many similarities
of peculiar detail, occur in countries so far apart ;
and in the second place, if what was carried by
trade was the art of building alone, why should
the learners go out of their way to use huge stones
when smaller ones would have suited their purpose
equally well ? That the megalithic builders knew
how to employ smaller stones we know from their
work ; that they preferred to use large ones for
certain purposes was not due to ignorance or
chance, it was because the large stone as such had
some particular meaning and association for them.
We cannot definitely say that large stones were
themselves actually worshipped, but there can
be no possible doubt that for some reason or other
they were regarded" as peculiarly fit to be used
in sanctified places such as the tombs of the dead.
It is impossible that the men who possessed the
skill to lay the horizontal upper courses of the

150

WHO WERE THE BUILDERS?

Hagiar Kim temple should have taken the trouble
to haul to the spot and use vast blocks over 20
feet in length where far smaller ones would have
been more convenient, unless they had some deep-
seated prejudice in favour of great stones.

Such are the main difficulties involved by the
influence theory. On the other hand, objections
have been urged against the idea that the monu-
ments were all built by one and the same race.
Thus Dr. Montelius in his excellent Orient unci
Enropa says, " In Europe at this time dwelt
Aryans, but the Syrians and Sudanese cannot be
Aryans," the inference being, of course, that the
European dolmens were built by a different race
from that which built those of Syria and the Sudan.
Unfortunately, however, the major premise is
not completely true, for though it is true that
Aryans did live in Europe at this time, there were
also people in Europe who were not Aryans, and
it is precisely among them that megalithic buildings
occur.

The French archaeologist Dechelette also con-
demns the idea of a single race. " Anthropo-
logical observations," he says, " have long since
ruined this adventurous hypothesis." He does
not tell us what these observations are, but we
presume that he refers to the occurrence of varying
skull types among the people buried in the mega-
lithic tombs. Nothing is more natural than that
some variation should occur. We are dealing

151

ROUGH STONE MONUMENTS

with a race which made enormous journeys, and
thus became contaminated by the various other
races with which it came in contact. It may even
have been a mixed race to start with. Thus even
if we found skulls of very different types in the
dolmens this would not in the least disprove the
idea that dolmen building was introduced into
various countries by one and the same race. It
would be simply a case of the common anthropo-
logical fact that a race immigrating into an already
inhabited country becomes to some extent modi-
fied by intermarriage with the earlier inhabitants.
The measurements given in the last chapter would
seem to show that despite local variation there
is an underlying homogeneity in the skulls of the
megalithic people.

It thus seems that the most probable theory
of the origin of the megalithic monuments is that
this style of building was brought to the various
countries in which we find it by a single race in an
immense migration or series of migrations. It is
significant that this theory has been accepted by
Dr. Duncan Mackenzie, who is perhaps the first
authority on the megalithic structures of the
Mediterranean basin.

One question still remains to be discussed. From
what direction did megalithic architecture come,
and what was its original home ? This is clearly
a point which is not altogether dependent on the

152

WHO WERE THE BUILDERS?

means by which this architecture was diffused.
Montelius speaks in favour of an Asiatic origin.
He considers that caves, and tombs accessible
from above, i.e. simple pits dug in the earth, were
native in Europe, while tombs reached from the
side, such as dolmens and corridor-tombs, were
introduced into Europe from the east. Salomon
Reinach, arguing mainly from the early appearance
of the objects found in the tombs of Scandinavia
and the rarity of the simpler types of monument,
such as the dolmen, in Germany and South
Europe, suggests that megalithic monuments first
appeared in North Europe and spread southwards.
Mackenzie is more inclined to believe in an African
origin. If he is right it may be that some climatic
change, possibly the decrease of rainfall in what
is now the Sahara desert, caused a migration
from Africa to Europe very similar to that which
many believe to have given to Europe its early
neolithic population. The megalithic people may
even have been a branch of the same vast race
as the neolithic : this would explain the fact that
both inhumed their dead in the contracted position.
It is probable that the problem will never be
solved. The only way to attempt a solution
would be to show that in some part of the mega-
lithic area the structures were definitely earlier
than in any other, and that as we move away from
that part in any direction they become later and
later. Such a means of solution is not hopeful,

i53

ROUGH STONE MONUMENTS

for the earliest form of structure, the dolmen,
occurs in all parts of the area, and if we attempt
to date by objects we are met by the difficulty
that a dolmen in one place which contained copper
might be earlier than one in another place which
contained none, copper having been known in
the former place earlier than in the latter.

It still remains to consider the question of the
origin of the rock-hewn sepulchre and its relation
to the megalithic monument. The rock- tomb
occurs in Egypt, Phoenicia, Rhodes, Cyprus,
Crete, South Italy, Sicily, Sardinia, Malta, Pianosa,
the Iberian Peninsula, the Balearic Isles, and
France. In all these places there are examples
which are certainly early, i.e. belong to the
neolithic or early metal age, with the exception of
Malta and perhaps Rhodes and Phoenicia. Two
types are common, the chamber cut in the vertical
face of rock and thus entered from the side,
sometimes by a horizontal passage, and the
chamber cut underground and entered from a
vertical or sloping shaft placed not directly over
the chamber, but immediately to one side of it.
It is unlikely that these two types have a separate
origin, for they are clearly determined by geo-
logical reasons. A piece of country where vertical
cliffs or faces of rock abounded was suited to the
first type, while the other alone was possible when
the ground consisted of a flat horizontal surface

154

WHO WERE THE BUILDERS?

of rock. We frequently find the two side by side
and containing identically the same type of re-
mains. In South-East Sicily we have the hori-
zontal entrance in the tombs of the rocky gorge
of Pantalica, while the vertical shaft is the rule
in the tombs of the Plemmirio, only a few miles
distant.

Two curious facts are noticeable with regard to
the distribution of the rock-hewn tombs. In the
first place they are all in the vicinity of the Medi-
terranean, and in the second some occur in the
megalithic area, while others do not. The examples
of Egypt, Cyprus, and Crete show that this type
of tomb flourished in the Eastern Mediterranean.
Was it from here that the type was introduced
into the megalithic area, or did the megalithic
people bring with them a tradition of building
rock-tombs totally distinct from that which is
represented by the tombs of Egypt, Cyprus, and
Crete ?

The question is difficult to answer. One thing
alone is clear, that in certain places, such as Malta
and Sardinia, the megalithic people were not
averse to reproducing in the solid rock the forms
which they more usually erected with large stones
above ground. The finest instance of this is the
Halsaflieni hypogeum in Malta, where the solid
rock is hewn out with infinite care to imitate the
form and even the details of surface building.

Similarly we have seen that both in Sardinia

i5S

ROUGH STONE MONUMENTS

and in France the same forms of tomb were
rendered in great stones or in solid rock almost
indifferently.

There can therefore be no doubt that the
hewing out of rock was practised by the megalithic
people, and that they were no mean exponents
of the art. We have no proof that they brought
this art along with them from their original
centre of dispersion, though if they did it is
curious that the}' did not carry it into other
countries where they penetrated besides those of
the Mediterranean. It may be that early rock-
tombs will yet be found in North Africa, but it
seems improbable that, had they existed in the
British Isles, in North Germany, or in Scandinavia,
not a single example should have been found.

On the other hand, if the megalithic people
did not bring the idea of the rock-tomb with
them we must suppose either that it evolved
among them after their migration, or that they
adopted it from the Eastern Mediterranean. The
last supposition is particularly unlikely, as it
would involve the modification of a burial custom
by foreign influence.

We have, in fact, no evidence on which to
judge the question. Perhaps it is least unreason-
able to suppose that the idea of the rock-tomb
was brought into the megalithic area by the same
people who introduced the megalithic monuments,
and did not result from contact with the Eastern

156

WHO WERE THE BUILDERS?

Mediterranean. Similarly we ought perhaps to
disclaim any direct connection between the corri-
dor-tombs of the megalithic area and the great
tholoi of Crete and the Greek mainland. At first
sight there is a considerable similarity between
them. The Treasury of Atreus at Mycenae with
its corbelled circular chamber and long rectangular
corridor seems very little removed, except in size
and finish, from the tombs of Gavr' Inis and Lough
Crew. Yet there are vital points of difference.
The two last are tombs built partly with upright
slabs on the surface of the ground, entered by
horizontal corridors, and covered with mounds.
The Treasury of Atreus is simply an elaborated
rock- tomb cut underground with a sloping shaft ;
as the ground consisted only of loose soil a coating
of stone was a necessity, and hence the resemblance
to a megalithic monument.

i57

BIBLIOGRAPHY

OF THE MEGALITHIC MONUMENTS

General

Fergusson, Rude Stone Monuments in all Countries

(London 1872).
Bonstetten, Essai sur les dolmens (Geneva 1865).
Mortillet, Compte rendu du congres d'archeologie

prehistorique, Stockholm, 1874, pp. 267 ff.
Reinach, Le mirage oriental, in L Anthropologic, 1893,

PP- 557 ff-
Montelius, Orient und Eur op a.

Borlase, The Dolmens of Ireland, Vols. II and III.

Reinach, Terminologie des monuments megalithiques

in Revue archeologique, 3e ser., XXII, 1893.

Westropp, Prehistoric Phases (London 1872).

England and Wales

Fergusson, op. cit.

Recent Excavations at Stonehenge, Archceologia, LVIII,

PP- 37 ff.

Flinders Petrie, Stonehenge : Plans, Descriptions, and
Theories (London 1880).

Windle, Remains of the Prehistoric Age in England.

James, Sir Henry, Plans and Photos of Stonehenge
and of Turnsuchan in the Island of Lewis (South-
ampton 1867).

Evans, Sir A., Archceological Review, II, 1889, pp.
313 ff-

159

ROUGH STONE MONUMENTS

Lockyer, Sir N., Nature, November 21st, 1901.
Hinks, XlXth Century, June, 1903, pp. 1002 ff.
Lockyer, Sir N., Nature, LXXI, 1904-5, pp. 297 ff.,

345 ff., 367 ff., 391 ff., 535 ff.
Lewis, A. A., Stone Circles in Britain, Archcsological

Journal, XLIX, pp. 136 ff.
Thurnam, Ancient British Barrows, Archceologia,

XLII, pp. 161 ff., XLIII, pp. 285 ff.
Lewis, A. A., Prehistoric Remains in Cornwall,

Journal of the Anthrop. Inst., XXV, 1895, and

XXXV, 1905.
Kermode and Herdman, Illustrated Notes on Manks

Antiquities (Liverpool 1904).

Scotland

Wilson, The Archceological and Prehistoric Annals

of Scotland.
Forbes Leslie, Early Races of Scotland.
Spence, Magnus, Standing Stones and Maeshowe of

Stenness.

Ireland

Borlase, Dolmens of Ireland.

Lewis, A. A., Some Stone Circles in Ireland, in
Journal Anthrop. Inst., XXXIX, pp. 517 ff.

Sweden

Montelius, Orient und Europa.

Montelius, Kulturgeschichte Schwedens.

Montelius, Dolmens en France et en Suede (Le Mans

1907).
Montelius, Graf fran stenaldern, upptackt vid

Cringe i Ekeby socken, 1907.

Nilsson, Das Steinalter, oder die Ureinwohner des

Scandinavischen Nordens (Hamburg 1865).

160

BIBLIOGRAPHY

Denmark

Montelius, Orient and Europa.
Sophus Miiller, V Europe prehistorique.
Sophus Miiller, Nordische Alterthumskunde.

Holland

Archaeological Journal, 1870, pp. 53 ff.
Journal Anthrop. Inst., VI, 1876, p. 158.
Compte rendu du congres d'arch. prehist., Stockholm,
1874.

Belgium

Engelhardt, Om stendysser og deres geograftske ud-
bredelse, in Aarboger f. nord. Oldkynd., 1870,
pp. 177 ff.

Germany

Krause und Schoetensack in Zeitschrift fur Ethnologie,

1893 (Altmark only).
Morlot, L' archeologie du Meclenbourg (Zurich 1868).
von Estorff, Heidnische Altertiimer der Gegend von

Aelzen (Hanover 1846).

Switzerland

Keller, Pfahlbauten, 3 Bericht (Zurich, i860), p. 101 ;
PI. XI, Figs. 8 and 9.

France

Cartailhac, La France prehistorique.

Bertrand in Revue archeologique, 1864 (List of

monuments).
Bertrand, Archeologie celtique et gauloise, 2nd edit.,

1889.
Dechelette, Manuel d' archeologie prehistorique celtique

et gallo-romaine, Vol. I.

m 161

ROUGH STONE MONUMENTS

Lewis, Alignements at Antun in Journal Anthrop.

Inst., XXXVIII, 1908, pp. 380 ff.
Lewis, On some dolmens of peculiar form, op. cit.,

XL, 1910, pp. 336 ff.
de Baye, L'archeologie prehistorique (Petit-Morin

tombs).
Reinach, S., La Sculpture en Europe (Angers 1896.

Figures of the ' dolmen deity ').

Spain

Cartailhac, Ages prehistorique de VEspagne.
Cartailhac, Monuments primitifs des iles baleares.
Bezzenberger in Zeitschrift fur Ethnologie, XXXIX,
1907, pp. 567 ff.

Italy

Bullettino di Paletnologia Italiana, XXV, pp. 178 ff.
Nicolucci, Brevi note sui monumenti megalitici di

Terra d'Otranto, 1893.
Bull Paletn. Hal., XXXVII, pp. 6 ff.
Mosso and Samarelli, II dolmen di Bisceglie, in Bull.

Paletn. Ital., XXXVI, pp. 26 ff. and 86 ff.

Sicily

Orsi in Bull. Paletn. Ital., XXIV, pp. 202-3 (Monte-

racello).
Orsi in Ausonia, 1907, pp. 1 ff. (Cava Lazzaro).
Orsi in Notizie degli Scavi, 1905, p. 432, Fig. 18 (Cava

Lavinaro).

Sardinia

La Marmora, Voyage en Sardaigne.
Pinza in Monumenti Antichi, Vol. VIII.
Nissardi in Atti del Congresso Intemazionale, Roma,
1903, sezione preistorica.

162

BIBLIOGRAPHY

Nissardi and Taramelli in Mon. Ant., Vol. XVII.
Taramelli in Memnon, Band II, Mai, 1908, pp. 1—35-
Prechac in Melanges d'archeologie et d'histoire,

XXVIII.
Mackenzie in Ausonia, III, 190%, PP- l8 ff-
Mackenzie in Memnon, Vol. II, fasc. 3.
Mackenzie in Papers of the British School of Rome,

V, pp. 89 ff. .

Taramelli, Notizie degli Scavi, 1904. PP- Z°l tt-

(Anghelu Ruju). Vyt\7

Colini in Bullettino di Paletnologia Itahana, XXIV,

pp. 252 ff.

Corsica
Nouvelles archives des missions scientifiques, Vol. Ill,
1892, pp. 49 ff.

PlANOSA

Bullettino di Paletn. Hal, XXIV, pp. 281 ff.

Malta
Mayr, A., Die vorgeschichtlichen Denkmdler von Malta.
Mayr, A., Die Insel Malta.

Zammit, First Report on the Halsaflieni Hypogeum.
Tagliaferro, The Prehistoric Pottery found in the
' Hypogeum at Halsaflieni, in Annals of Archeology

and Anthropology, Vol. Ill, pp. Iff.
Zammit and Peet, Report on the small objects found

at Halsaflieni (Valletta, in the Press).
Magri, Ruins of a Megalithic Temple at Xeuchta,

Gozo.
Ashby, T., and others, Report on Excavations at

Corradino, Mnaidra, and Hagiar Kim, appearing

in Vol. VI of Papers of the British School of

Rome.

163

ROUGH STONE MONUMENTS

Peet, Contributions to the Study of the Prehistoric
Period in Malta, Papers of the British School of
Rome, V, pp. 141 ff.

Tagliaferro, Prehistoric Burials in a Cave at Bur-
meghez, in Man, 191 1, pp. 147 ff.

North Africa

Faidherbe in Compte rendu du congres d'archeologie
prehistorique, Bruxelles, 1872, pp. 406 ff.

Flower in Transactions of the International Congress
of Prehistoric Archeology, Norwich, 1868, pp.
194 ff.

Maclver and Wilkin, Libyan Notes.

Morocco

Materiaux pour Vhistoire de Vhomme, V, p. 342 ;
VIII, p. 57; XX, p. 112.

Tunis

Cartailhac in V Anthropologic, 1903, pp. 620 ff.
Carton in V Anthropologic, 1891, pp. 1 ff.
Materiaux pour Vhistoire de Vhomme, XXI, PI. VI ;
XXII, pp. 373 and 416.

Egypt and the Sudan

Wilson and Felkin, Uganda and the Egyptian Sudan,

Vol. II, p. 123.
de Morgan, Recherches sur Vorigine de VEgypte,

p. 239, Fig. 398.

Pantelleria
Orsi in Monumenti Antichi, IX, pp. 449 ff.

Lampedusa
Ashby in Annals of Archeology and Anthropology,
Vol. IV.

164

/

BIBLIOGRAPHY

Bulgaria

Mittheilungen der anthropologischen Gesellschaft in

Wien, 1888, pp. 285 ff.
L'Anthropologie, 1890, p. no.

Crimea
Borlase, Dolmens of Ireland, III, p. 722.

Caucasus and Crimea

Chantre, Recherches anthropologiques dans le Caucase,
Vol. I, pp. 50 ff.

Chantre in Verhandlungen der Berliner Anthropolo-
gischen Gesellschaft, 1882, p. 344.

Materiaux pour Vhistoire de Vhomme, 1885, pp. 545 ff.

Borlase, Dolmens of Ireland, III, p. 722.

Syria and Palestine

Palestine Exploration Fund, Quarterly Reports for

1882 ; Annual, 191 1, pp. 1 ff.
Conder, Heth and Moab, pp. 190, 293.
Perrot and Chipiez, IV, pp. 341, 378-9.

Persia

de Morgan in Revue mensuelle de VEcole d 'anthropo-
logic de Paris, 1902, p. 187.
de Morgan, La delegation en Perse, 1902.
de Morgan, Vhistoire d'Elam, Paris, 1902.

India

Transactions of the Royal Irish Academy, XXIV,

1865.
Westropp, Prehistoric Phases.

165

ROUGH STONE MONUMENTS

COREA

, Journal Anthrop. Inst., XXIV, p. 330.

Japan

Gowland in Archceologia, IN, pp. 439 #•
Gowland in Journal Anthrop. Inst., 1907, pp. 10 ff.

166

INDEX

Abbameiga, 85

Aberdeen, circles near, 38

Adrianople, 114

Africa, 90-6

Aiga, 85

Ain Dakkar, 117

Ainu, the, 122

Ala Safat, 116

Alemtejo, 71

Algeria, 91-5

Alignements, 3, 59-60, 89,

119-20, 124, 154-7
Allies couvertes, 3, 61, 64
Altar Stone at Stonehenge, 18
Altmark, 57
Amman, 117
Ammon, 115
Anghelu Ruju, 88
Anglesey, 27, 29
Annaclochmullin, 145
Antequera, 70
Arbor Low, 25
Arcturus, 50, 51
Aries, 64

Aries, Council of, 12
Arran, circles on, 35-6
Arthur, King, n, 25
Arthur's Quoit, 29
Asia, 114-22
Atreus, Treasury of, 157
Aurelius Ambrosius, 15
Avebury, 23-4, 27-8
Avening, 33, 127

Axe, cult of, 137^8
Axe-shaped pendants, 80, 112
Axevalla Heath, 54

Baetyls, 104, 105-6, 137
Balearic Isles, 71-5
Barnstone, the, 36-7
Barrows, long, 30-3
Barth, 90
Belgium, 58
Bellary, 118

Bell-shaped cup, 64, 81, 136
Beltane festival, 37
Benigaus Nou, 74
Bertrand, 64, 143
Birori, 82, 133
Bisceglie, 76
Bonstetten, 143
Borreby, 54-5
Boscawen-un, 26
" Bou Merzoug, 92
Bou Nouara, 91
Boyle Somerville, Captain, 50
Brittany, 59-60
Brogar, Ring of, 36-7
Broholm, 54
Bulgaria, 114
Button, conical, 42, 71, in,

135

Caesar, 27

Cairns, horned, 38-9

167

INDEX

Caithness, cairns of, 38-9
Callais, 63, 64, 66, 67, 71,

132
Callernish Circle, 34
Calvados, 64
Canister, 39
Can de Ceyrac, 60
Caouria, 89
Capella, 50, 51
Carnac, 13, 59-60
Carrick-a-Dhirra, 43
Carrickard, 45
Carrickglass, 41
Carrigalla, 49
Carrowmore, 41-2
Cashtal-yn-Ard, 145
Cassibile, 80
Castelluccio, 80, 81
Castor, 50
Caucasus, 114
Cava Lavinaro, 78
Cava Lazzaro, 78
Cave burial, 81, 88
Chagford, 29

Champ Dolent, menhir of, 13
Channel Isles, 67
Charlemagne, 12
Charlton's Abbott, 33
China, 122
Chittore, 119
Chun Quoit, 29
' Circles, stone, 15-28, 34-8,

48-51, 60, 96, 115
Cirta, 92
Clava, 37

Clynnog Fawr, 128
Collorgues, 137
Constantine, 91
Contracted burials, 33, 54,

62, 77, 80, 81, 93, 97, in,

140-1, 153
Coolback, 43

Corbelled roofs, 6, 32, 45, 48,

69, 73, 84, 86, 87, 102-3
Cordin, 105, 108
Corea, 122

Cornwall, dolmens in, 29
— monuments of, 26
Corridor-tombs, 3, 43-8, 52-5,

56-8, 62-4, 67-71, 76-7,

96, 118, 120-2
Corse, Cape, 89
Corsica, 88-9
Coursed masonry, use of, 5,

73,82
Cove, the, 25

Cremation, 35, 42, 66, 140
Crete, 113, 132, 142, 155, 157
Crickstone, the, 30
Crimea, 1 14
Cromlechs, 3

Cumberland, monuments of, 25
Cup-markings, 117, 127-8
Cyprus, 155
Cyrenaica, 91

Dance Maen Circle, 26

Date of megaliths, 123

Dax, 64

Deccan, 118-9

Dechelette, 139, 151

de Morgan, 90

Denmark, 53-5

Dennis, 76

Der Ghuzaleh, 116

Dolmens, 2, 29, 40-1, 52-3,
56, 58, 61, 67-8, 82, 89,
90, 91-6, 108, 1 14-9

Drawings on stones, 46, 48,

55, 62> IIQ
Drewsteignton, 29

Druids, 11, 27-8

Edfu, 90

168

INDEX

Eguilaz, 68

Egypt, 155

Ellez, 96

England, monuments of, 15-33

Erdeven, 60

Er-Lanic, 60

Eskimos, 126

Es Tudons, nau of, 73~4

Evans, Sir Arthur, 20, 105

Facades, curved, 78, 145-6
Faidherbe, General, 143
Faustina, medal of, 95
Feraud, M., 92-3
Fergusson, 28, 143
Fibrolite, 63

Finistere, dolmens of, 13
Fontanaccia, 89
Fonte Coberta, 68
Forbes Leslie, Colonel, 119
France, 59-67
Friar's Heel, 18, 21

Galilee, 115
Gargantua, 11
Gaulstown, 41
Gavr'inis, 62, 137
Gebel Mousa, 116
Geoffrey of Monmouth, 26
Ger, 64

Germany, 56—7
Get, 39
Gezer, 124
Giant's Bed, 56
Giant's Tombs, 87-8
Gigantia, 104
Giraldus Cambrensis, 15
Gohlitzsch, 137
Gozo, Is., 104
Greenland, 125
Grewismuhlen, 56
Grotte des Fees, 64, 74

M 2

Grotte du Castellet, 64

Hagiar Kim, 6, 103-4

Hakpen Hill, 24, 27

Halsaflieni, 108 13, 130

Hauptville's Quoit, 25

Hengist, 15

Herrestrup, 53

Highwood, 45

Hinks, Mr., 22

Hirdmane Stone, 13

Holed tombs, 77, 114, 116,

117, 126-7
Holland, 57-8
Horned cairns, 146
-Hiinenbetter, 45, 56-8
Hurlers, the, 26

Idanha a Nova, 139
India, 118-20
Inigo Jones, 27
Inverness, circles in, 37-8
Ireland, monuments of, 40-51
Iron, 39, 46, 93, "9
Italy, 76-7

Jadeite, 63
James I, 27
Japan, 120-2
Jaulan, 1 17
Jimmu, 121
Judsea, 115

Karleby, 54
Karnak (Egypt), 22
Keamcorravooly, 44
Keller, 56
Kennet Avenue, 24
Kerlescan, 60
Kermario, 60
Keswick Circle, 25
Khasi Hills, 119

169

INDEX

Kingarth, circle at, 36
Kirkabrost, circle at, 36
Kit's Coty House, 29
Knyttkarr, 55
Komei, 121
Kosseir, 118

Labbamologa, 43
Lado, 90

Lampedusa, Isle of, 96
Lanyon Quoit, 29, 127
La Perotte, 7
Leaba Callighe, 43
Lecce, 76
Lewis, Isle of, 34
Linosa, Isle of, 96, 132
Lockyer, SirNorman, 21-2, 51
Long Meg and her daughters,

25
Losa, 85

Los Millares, 70, 137, 145

Lough Crew, 45, 48, 62

Lough Gur, 48-51

Lozere, 130

Lundhoj, 55

Liittich, 58

Maclver, D. R., 93-4
Mackenzie, Duncan, 85, 152,

153
Maeshowe, 36-7

Malta, 98-113

Man, Isle of, 30

Mane-er-Hroeck, 62-3

Marcella, 68

Matera, 77

Maughold, 30

Mayborough Circle, 25

Mayr, Albert, 105

Meayll Hill, 30

Melilli, 80

Men-an-tol, 30

Menec, 59

Menhirs, 2, 29, 59, 11 5-6,
123-4

— , Cult of, 12, I23-4

Merivale, circle at, 26
Merlin, 15

Merry Maidens, the, 26
Messa, 90
Minieh, 116
Mnaidra, 100-3
Moab, 115-7
Molafa, 88

Monte Abrahau, 71

Montelius, O., 126, 151, 153

Monteracello, 78

Morocco, 96

Mortillet, de, 59, 144

Mourzouk, 90

Msila, 93

Munster, tombs of, 44

Mursia, 97

Musta, 108

Mycenean vases, 81

Naas, 15

Nantes, Council of, 12
Nara, 121
Nans, 73-4, 145
Navetas, see A'aus
Neermul jungle, 118
Newbliss, 145
New Grange, 46, 62
Nile valley, 90
Nilgiri Hills, 118
Nine Maidens, the, 26
Nissardi, 84
Norway, 53
Nossiu, 85, 87
Nuraghi, 82-7

Obsidian, 77, 134
Odin's Stone, 11, 36

170

INDEX

Orkney Isles, cairns of, 38-9
Orry's Grave, 30, 127
Orsi, Paolo, 78, 79
Orthostatic slabs, use of, 4,
69, 74, 80, 96, 100

Palmella, 71

Pantalica, So, 155

Pantelleria, Isle of, 96-8

Papa-Westra, 39

Pehada, 114

Penrith Circle, 11

Pentre Ifan, 29

Pera, 115

Perigord, 13

Persia, 114

Petit Morin, 66-7, 130

Pfaffikon, Lake, 56

Phoenicia, 154

Pianosa, 89

Picardt, John, 57

Pierre du Diable, La, 58

Pier res Plates, Les, 61

Piper, the, 26

Plas Newydd, 29, 127

Plemmirio, 155

Pliny, 27

Portico-dolmens, 40-1* 52>

119
Portugal, 67
Pottery, 135-6

Reinach, Salomon, 144
Religion, megalithic, 105-6,

137-9
Rhodes, 154
Rinaiou, 89
Rock-tombs, 3, 66-7, 71, 74,

79-81, 88
Rockbarton, 48
Rodmarton, 33, 127
Roknia, 94

Rollright Circle, 25, 29, 50

Saint George, 88

Saint-Germain-sur-Vienne, 12

Saint Michel, Mont, 63

Saint Pantaleon, 60

Saint Sermin, 139

Saint Vincent, 74

Sant' Elia, Cape, 88

Sardinia, 82-8

S'Aspru, 85

Scandinavia, 52_5

Scotland, monuments of, 34-9

Sculptures, 67, 138

Secondary burial, 79, 141-2

Senam, the, 93-4

Seriphos, 139

Serucci, 85

Sesi, the, 97-8

Shap, circle at, 23

Sicily, 77-82

Sidbury Hill, 21

Sidon, 115

Siggewi, 108

Silbury Hill, 24, 28

Siret, Messieurs, 68

Sjobol, 53

Skulls, 77, 112, 129-31

Sorapoor, 118

Spain, 67-71

Spence, Magnus, 37

Stanton Drew, 25, 49

Star-worship, 23, 50-1, 128

Steatopygous figures, 107, 1 12

Stenness, Ring of, 36

Stonehenge, 15-23

Stoney-Littleton, 32

Stripple Stones, the, 26

Stromness, circle at, 36

Stukeley, Dr., 27

Su Cadalanu, 84

Sudan, 90

I7i

INDEX

Suetonius, 27

Sun-worship, 21-3, 28-9, 37,

Sweden, 52-5
Switzerland, 56
Syria, 115-8

Table des Marchands, La, 16,

137

Tagliaferro, Professor, 108,

in
Tahutihotep, tomb of, 8
Talayots, 71-3
Tamuli, 139
Tangier, 96
Tarentum, 76
Tattooing, 139
" Three Brothers of Grugith,"

the, 128
Tiberias, 115
Tinaarloo, 57
Toledo, Council of, 12
Torebo, 53
Tours, Council of, 12
Trade relations, 13 1-3
Tregeseal, circles near, 26
Trepanned skulls, 62
Trilithons, 2, 17, 90, 100-1,

103-4, 117

Tripoli, 90-1
Truddhi% 86
Tsil, 117-8
Tunis, 95-6
Tyfta, 54
Tyre, 115
Tzarskaya, 114

Unebi, Mt., 121

Vail Gorguina, 67

Vellore, 118

Villafrati, 81

Villages, megalithic, 74, 85-6,

97

Wales, monuments of, 29
Watchstone, the, 36-7
Wayland the Smith's Cave,

11, 14, 30, 32
Wedge-shaped tomb, 44~5»

55, 70-1, 117
Westgothland, 54
West Tump, 146

Yarhouse, 39
Zammit, Dr. T. , 112

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STAMPED BELOW

AN INITIAL FINE OF 25 CENTS

WILL BE ASSESSED FOR FAILURE TO RETURN
THIS BOOK ON THE DATE DUE. THE PENALTY
WILL INCREASE TO 50 CENTS ON THE FOURTH
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OVERDUE.

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OCT 10 1932

SEP 11 1933

GCT 23 1933
APR 5 1937

MAH »a 1938

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APR

9 1939

APR 23 1940

MAB 26 1942-f

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MAR 21 194C

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